The World Is Different
by azurefang
Summary: Klaus has finished the mansion in Mystic Falls and he is living there with his mother and siblings. Esther is planning a fancy ball as a "housewarming." Prior to that, Rebekah and Finn get into some trouble. (Esther and her children.)
1. Chapter 1

THE WORLD IS DIFFERENT

Disclaimer: The Vampire Diaries does not belong to me. Original characters, such as Mark, are mine.

_A/N This story takes place in Mystic Falls between the time Elijah released his siblings from their coffins and Esther held the formal ball and moved toward killing her children._

_The story includes Esther and her five children, but is mainly about Rebekah and Finn who get into trouble._

Chapter 1

Rebekah stood in front of the full-length mirror in her bedroom. She was nude, except for the big bouffant shower cap that had kept her hair dry while she took a nice hot shower. She removed the plastic cap and let her blonde hair fall freely about her shoulders. The tips of the longest strands caressed her breasts.

As anyone did who stood nude before a big mirror, she studied her body. She had a good figure and always would have one. She had been turned into a vampire by her mother at age eighteen and she would never change. Not physically, anyway. Her eyes roved to her groin area. She was a natural blonde. Of the five siblings who survived into adulthood, two of them were blonds – she and Niklaus. They had got their coloring from their mother Esther, although her husband Mikael was also somewhat blond. The other three brothers had brown hair, Elijah's very dark.

Always, when she looked at herself like this she remembered a scene from her young childhood. There were probably thousands of moments that she had forgotten, but this one always came back and it always embarrassed her. She guessed that she had been two years old or two-and-a-half. At that time, she was the youngest child, although later her mother would have another baby.

In her memory, the incident played out simply enough at first. She thought it must have been in the heat of summer when she slept on the bedding nude. She was trying to put on her clothes by herself one morning, but at that moment, she was naked. Kol, who was two years older was also getting ready to dress. She had seen him naked before, but she hadn't noted the difference between their bodies, perhaps because he tended to turn his bare back toward her when he was unclothed. This time she did notice.

There was something attached to his lower body. She thought his parts were one thing and spoke of them as one. She didn't have anything similar and she asked him about it. He told her what he used it for, that he could stand to urinate while she had to squat down. He also pointed out that she couldn't have one because she was a _girl_. He said it in such a tone of voice that she could tell he was proud of his attachment and, as a girl, she wasn't allowed to have one.

She felt both insulted and cheated. Young as she was, she tended to stand up for her rights and insisted that she should have one, too. Kol teased her while he played with his personal toy and she got angry. She started to cry in frustration as she kicked his shins with her bare feet and tried to push him down. He wasn't a big boy, but at four years old or so, he was certainly bigger and stronger than she was.

The commotion they made attracted the attention of the only other person close by at the moment, their big brother Finn, a teenager. He came to them and demanded to know what the problem was. It wasn't unusual for the two youngest to get into arguments and small physical fights now and then, but everyone made sure Kol didn't really hurt his little sister. At the moment, both of them were in a state of undress.

"Why don't I got one?" Rebekah demanded angrily as tears streamed down her red face. She pointed at Kol's attachment. "Where mine?"

"Kol, put your clothes on _now_," Finn ordered. "Don't you ever tease Rebekah about that again. You hear me?"

Kol had nodded quickly and grabbed up his clothes to move farther away.

Rebekah had turned to her big brother and demanded again to know where her thing was. Finn didn't have an answer other than that girls didn't have one. He knelt down by her, helped dress her despite some angry resistance on her part and told her she didn't need one of those things.

"Kol got one. I want one," she insisted.

He told her she should ask their mother about it. At that time, she didn't consider that each of her other brothers might have what Kol had.

Apparently, Finn had spoken to Esther, because the two females in the family had had a talk about anatomy. The mother did it in such a way that the little girl felt that she was special and had something hidden in her body that was very important. After that, she had rarely resented being a female, although later she had been annoyed by the occurrence of that monthly period, and when she became a sterile vampire, she felt robbed of the ability to have a baby.

Now, looking at herself in the mirror, she still felt the same way, not about the missing external parts, but about not being able to get pregnant. If she could change things, she would choose to become a normal, mortal woman, marry and have babies.

She knew she was not the only one who was sometimes unhappy to be a vampire. Her brother Finn didn't like it either. Finn had voiced his opinion quite a few times and had annoyed brother Niklaus enough that the middle sibling had stabbed Finn in the heart with a special dagger and confined him to a coffin for hundreds of years.

Nik was rather temperamental and kept enough of the special daggers tipped in white oak ash to put any or all of his siblings into suspended animation when he felt like it. Incredibly, he had also kept their mother in the same state, although not with a dagger. Now, all of them were out of the coffins and in this house. It was a strange situation.

With a sigh, Rebekah turned away from the mirror and her old memories and moved to pick out the clothes she wanted to wear for breakfast. In a few minutes, she was dressed in white slacks and camisole top. Almost ready to leave her room, she looked at the rumpled bed. It was occupied by a sleeping young man sprawled on his abdomen and snoring softly. When he had rolled over, the top sheet had ended up under him so that he was bare from his head to his toes. For a moment Rebekah admired the view, but then she decided it was time he got up and left the house.

"Mark. Come on, love. It's time to get up," she said, shaking his shoulder. She had been out the evening before and had met this fellow at The Grill. Downtown Mystic Falls lacked much in the way of entertainment, but there were other places nearby. Still, she rather liked the local bar and grill.

Mark groaned and turned over. He had a hangover, having drunk too much the evening before. He opened his eyes and looked up at the pretty blonde grinning down at him. For a moment, he didn't recognize her, but then he recalled following her car as she led him to a mansion outside of town. And he vaguely recalled getting in bed with her for some really good sex. After that, his memory seemed to be blank.

"Time for you to go home," Rebekah said, taking his hand and hauling him up to a sitting position. He was what she called a "cutie," even thought he was not looking his best at the moment. His breath smelled bad, but she didn't intend to kiss him this morning. She bent down and picked up his shorts from the floor and handed them to him. "Come on. Get dressed."

"I'm not half awake yet and you're kicking me out," he complained, pressing his hands to his aching head.

"Afraid so. My whole family is in this house. Think of my reputation." She really was not concerned about what anyone thought. Her brothers thought nothing about having women in their beds and they didn't comment on her choices either. Then again, their mother Esther was also in residence, but she was not critical of her children's choices of bed companions either.

Mark stood up and made his way to Rebekah's bathroom. When he returned to the sit on the edge of the bed, he pulled on his underwear and proceeded to put on his other clothes as Rebekah handed them to him.

"Is this house as big as it looked when we drove up here last night?" he asked, buttoning his shirt. "I was sort of drunk and I'm not sure."

"It's big. Our family has money."

"Rich, huh?"

"Stinking rich, especially my brother Nik. He bought this house from an old couple whose kids are long ago grown and gone. Then he spent another fortune remodeling and modernizing the place. I think he paid double wages so the work would be done faster. You could say he's impatient."

"You said your whole family is here now?"

"Yes. I have four brothers. And my mother. Most unusual for all of us to be together like this, but none of us is married now or living somewhere else. I say 'all of us', but my father isn't here. He's sort of … well … bad."

"Not a nice guy? My dad isn't, either."

"I somehow suspect my dad is worse, but I won't go into that." She watched him put on shoes and socks. Looking around, she spotted his car keys and cell phone on the night stand and handed them to him.

Although the morning hour was early, she was not the only family member who was up and about. As she and Mark walked from her room out into the upstairs hall, they met her brother Finn. She looped her arm around Finn's and said, "Finn, this is Mark. Mark, my brother Finn."

The moment seemed a little awkward and neither man offered to shake hands, although they nodded to each other.

"Mark is just leaving," Rebekah informed her brother as they came to the top of the stairs. When they went down to the foyer, her brother Kol came along and she made the introductions again.

Kol grinned, shook Mark's hand, suddenly clutched him close and bit his neck. Mark was shocked and tried to push his attacker away.

"Kol, stop it!" Rebekah yelled in disbelief. How dare he do that!

_A/N I hope you all liked the start of this new story. I haven't written a Finn story, so I thought I would pick on him and his sister for a change._


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Kol!" Finn also yelled with both surprised and disgusted. He grabbed his brother's arm.

The youngest brother, ignoring his brother and sister and the grip on his arm, didn't take more than one good swallow of blood before he withdrew his fangs and gave a quick lick to the small wounds to seal them and to clean the skin. Licking his own lips clean and jerking his arm free of Finn's hand, he then released the stricken man.

Rebekah stepped up without hesitation, got Mark to look her in the eye and quickly compelled him to forget what had just happened. He was a little shaky as she held onto his arms. Now, instead of looking frightened, he looked confused.

"You were a bit dizzy there for a minute," she said to him. "The hangover, I imagine. Do you think you're alright to drive home?"

"Yeah. I feel okay, I guess," he assured her. He looked at each of her brothers, both of whom were looking at him with concern. He didn't know their concern was fake.

Rebekah let the young man out the door and as soon as she closed the door, she turned on Kol.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" she yelled in his face and gave him a shove. It was a rhetorical question because Kol did things like that and she knew it. Too often he gave in to his impulses to shock other people. It amused him.

"He wasn't important to you!" he yelled back, but with a grin. He pushed his sister back several steps. "Admit it, sweetheart! You were done with him."

"Probably, but that isn't the point! Tell him, Finn."

"I agree it was uncalled for, Kol. Your rash behavior has not changed in all this time," the older brother said with disapproval.

"Like you'd know. You don't know what I've been doing," Kol said with a snort and a smirk.

It was an unkind reminder to Finn that brother Klaus had kept him daggered in the coffin for a very long time. Centuries of changes and events had passed him by and Finn resented that. But he tended to be a quiet fellow and rarely voiced strong feelings aloud unless he was challenged or really angry.

"What is all this commotion, my darlings?" asked their mother Esther as she came down the stairway.

The three looked up at her and became quiet. They were still in awe over the fact that she was with them. They had all thought she had died a long time ago, even longer ago than when Klaus began daggering his siblings and storing them in coffins in safe places.

"It's nothing, Mother," Rebekah said. There was no point in telling Esther what her youngest son had done. "How are you this morning?"

"I'm well. I must say I am enjoying living in this lap of modern luxury," she said, joining her children in the foyer. She was attired nicely.

"That's wonderful, Mother," Finn said, giving his mother a kiss on the cheek. "I am also, although I must admit that there are so many new inventions that I am a bit overwhelmed."

"They are fantastic," the woman agreed.

This was only the second morning since the evening that the coffins had been opened. Rebekah and Kol had been out and about on several other occasions over the years, while Elijah had spent the most time active in the world. Klaus, of course, did not put himself into a coffin. He had been active down through the ages and for the most part, enjoying it. However, many of the frustrations of his human days were still with him.

"Let us go see what is for breakfast," Finn said and offered his arm for his mother to walk her to the dining room. Because Finn had last lived a long time ago, he had limited knowledge of modern English. However, he had lived in England and France back then and had learned to speak in the manner spoken at that time. He also could read Latin and Greek. He was a very fast learner when it came to languages and was picking up modern words and phrases from Klaus, Elijah and Rebekah. He used their manner of speech. For some reason, his mother already seemed to know the current language usage.

Rebekah glared at Kol, who smirked at her, but neither said anything more about his biting Mark. During the night, she herself had bitten the young man twice and had compelled him to forget it.

All of the siblings knew that biting for blood could be done neatly by keeping the lips on the skin and by licking the wounded area carefully. On the other hand, the process could be messy if the biter was careless, letting saliva and blood escape, resulting in blood running down the chin and neck of the biter and down the neck and chest of the bitten. Needless to say, biting with the intent to injure or kill was always messy.

Rebekah knew Kol was right about one thing. She didn't intend to see Mark again. It had just been a "one-night stand." Now, walking behind her mother and Finn, she eyed their clothing. She had taken Esther shopping the next morning after her release from the coffin so that she would have an assortment of new clothing. After all, she had had only the garment she had worn in the coffin down through the ages. Esther had been able to wear a dress that belonged to her daughter just for the shopping trip.

So now the mother was wearing a nice dress and modern undergarments, plus some comfortable flat shoes. Her blonde hair was clean and tied back with a ribbon. Esther had been around fifty two years old when she had been killed and she was still a nice-looking woman.

Finn was also nicely dressed because Elijah had taken him shopping. Finn was not a perfectionist about clothing like Elijah was, but he did like the clothes his brother had helped him buy. Kol liked casual clothes for the most part and was wearing jeans, a plaid shirt and cross-trainer shoes.

In the dining room, they found Elijah at the table in one of the side seats. The head of the table was reserved for Klaus. It was his house. Elijah was reading the morning addition of a newspaper. As usual, he was wearing a proper suit and tie. He was drinking coffee and had not yet eaten anything from the covered serving dishes being set on the table by a female servant. He stood up when he saw the two ladies because he was a gentleman, and he remained standing until Finn had seated Esther and Rebekah had seated herself. She didn't expect Kol to hold the chair for her even though he knew he should.

"What was all that commotion I heard?" Elijah asked, looking at Rebekah.

"Just Kol being his usual disgusting self," she said, rolling her eyes. "It's nothing." She didn't want to discuss the happening further. She didn't look at the offending brother, even thought she could see out of the corner of her eye that he made a face at her.

In a minute, Klaus also joined them, smiling at everyone and cheerfully greeting them. He had not really intended for the lot of them to be his house guests, at least not until he was ready. But he had angered Elijah, who had released the siblings still inert in the coffins. Esther had risen from her coffin separately because it was closed with a magic spell. Initially, when she had walked into the house, Klaus had thought his mother would kill him, because he had caused her death, but she had offered to forgive him. She said she wanted her children all together as a family in this lovely house.

The meal started out with pleasant conversation, but it soon deteriorated into debates and arguments. This was no surprise to anyone, since they had always been a contentious group. Some of this chat centered around the olden days when the group had been normal humans and some of it was about later happenings. No one particularly mentioned the fact that Esther had turned her family into vampires or that eventually Klaus had killed her and put her in a coffin.

After the meal, Rebekah talked her brother Finn into going for a drive with her. He agreed, but she sensed that he was nervous. After they got into her car, she asked, "Are you alright?"

"I am. Why would I not be?" he asked, his hands tightly gripping the seat belt he had clicked in place as instructed. He cringed as she drove out of the driveway with a small squeal of tires.

"Finn, you don't have to pretend everything is alright."

"The world is so different now. _Everything_ is changed! It's as if I have been dropped by a large bird into a country that is completely foreign to me." There was a hint on distress in his tone.

"I know this modern world is damned scary. Inventions used to take years or decades to come about. Now new things are invented all the time. Whatever is here today, can be improved upon tomorrow. People today want bigger and better – or smaller and better. It takes a lot of getting used to. Once you get past that, it's great."

"I've no doubt you're correct. Elijah said something like that. He seems quite comfortable with the way things are. He reminded me that we all had to adjust when we sailed from our Viking settlement to the cities of Europe."

"That's right. And that was a _big_ adjustment," Rebekah said, remembering the wonders of the twelfth century. "Things progressed better and faster after that."

"Most certainly faster. Are you sure you have control of this vehicle?" he asked nervously as she went around a curve in the road way faster than a horse could have run. It made his stomach lurch and he swallowed several times.

"Yes. Absolutely. Trust me," she said. She had driven cars back in the 1920s, but had not again until Klaus released her from her coffin some months ago. Then he had taught her quickly how to drive a modern car and she now had a proper license.

Finn had little choice about trusting her ability, but he was wishing he had stayed at the house. He clearly recalled a time when his sister had driven a horse-drawn two-wheeled cart at a reckless speed and overturned it. He guessed that she had probably forgotten the incident, but it was much fresher in his mind. Almost all of the intervening years were lost to him as if they had not existed.

"_Nine hundred years_! Niklaus left me in that coffin for centuries! How could he do that to me when he let others of you out?" It had been incredibly unfair of the middle brother.

Rebekah could hear the anger in his voice. He was a very low-key, controlled fellow, somewhat like Elijah, but different. Each of them could be pushed to an angry reaction.

"I can't answer that. Who knows what Nik thinks or why he does what he does?"

"I remember so many things from when I was awake. Such wonders we saw when we left the wilds of this country and sailed to Europe. I was astounded, but I loved it," he admitted. "I would have liked to see how it went along the way. But all this … it is overwhelming. Did I say that right?"

"Yes. I know it is overwhelming at first, but you will adjust quickly just as you did before."

"So you say. So says everyone, even Mother, who has slept longer than I have."

"She does seem to be adapting quickly," Rebekah agreed. She wondered why her mother seemed attuned to the modern ways. She didn't yet know that Esther had been able to monitor the activities of her children, even from her coffin, as the centuries went by. Esther knew things she didn't want to know and she harbored a great deal of hidden anger.

"I asked Elijah if he had seen Sage or heard of her at any time. Have you?" the brother asked, changing the subject.

Rebekah knew that Sage was a woman Finn had turned into a vampire a long time ago. The two of them had been in love. But then Klaus had daggered Finn and all contact was lost when the woman left the area they were in at that time.

"As far as I know, Sage is still around," she said. "I don't know exactly where she is right now."

"That is what Elijah said. I would love to make contact with her and see if we could re-ignite the old romance."

"I'm sure that would be nice." She didn't point out that in all this time, Sage had undoubtedly moved on to someone else. Probably several someones.

While that old romance seemed eons ago to Rebekah, it obviously seemed like just yesterday to her brother. He was still in love. She knew he was a sensitive fellow. He had feelings that he mostly kept to himself, although his siblings and mother were somewhat attuned to them. The sister now wondered how this brother would do in the era he now found himself. Would he really adjust? Did it feel hopelessly alien to him so that nothing was familiar? She had an idea and hoped it would help him get reconnected somehow.

_A/N I know this story is going slowly, but it will pick up. I always thought Elijah was the oldest of the "children," but is seems Finn is – not counting the child (or children) borne by Esther before him. I wonder if the child stolen from her and Mikael became a vampire when she cast the spell that made her five remaining children vampires. Wouldn't that child still have been raised in the early settlement? Did some of the settlement people sail back to Europe before the rest of them did and the child went with them? Questions, questions._


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

It had always interested Rebekah that Finn was one of the ones who had some control over magic like their mother had. Esther had been a strong witch and likely still was. She had the magic touch, so to speak. While the mother had expected the daughter to inherit the ability, Rebekah had not. It was to two of the boys that it went, to Finn and to Kol. However, once she had made them into vampires, they no longer had any of that power. Kol had complained about the loss, while Finn had resented becoming a vampire.

The road Rebekah was driving on was two-lane, rural and winding. West of town it went to the Wickery bridge over the river that ran along the north side of the town, the river whose falls gave the town its name.

"Please slow down or stop and let me out," Finn groaned.

"Oh, oh. Are you going to be sick?"

He nodded, his eyes closed.

"I forgot you get motion sickness. You used to have trouble riding in coaches," she said. She recalled that he had often ridden sitting outside the horse-drawn coach beside the driver, but he had preferred traveling by riding horseback. "Did you get sick riding in Elijah's car yesterday?"

"Not like this. The road was straighter. I don't think he was going as fast as this."

"I was going to stop here anyway," she said as she pulled over to a wide graveled place and stomped on the brake.

Finn's stomach lurched and he swallowed hard as the vehicle came to a sudden stop. The seat belt dug into his shoulder. "Good," he managed to say, relieved that the car had stopped. He had always been embarrassed by the motion sickness and he now knew that it was a problem he would have to deal with frequently.

"I came here because I wanted to show you something." She said as she was about to get out of the car. She watched Finn try to release his seat belt. The mechanism was a little different from Elijah's car. She leaned over and helped him. Once she had him free he opened the door and jumped out, where he then took a moment to vomit his breakfast into the grass beyond the graveled area.

"I apologize for this. It's embarrassing," he said, wiping his lips with a silk handkerchief that Elijah had bought for him.

"I should have remembered. I'm sorry. Come over here. Follow me," she said, leading the way down a path and into the woods.

Curious, Finn followed his sister. In a few minutes, they came to a rocky shelf that overlooked the river, which was not very wide, but was about ten feet deep at this point.

"Recognize this?" the blonde girl asked with a grin.

Finn looked around and grinned, too. Although the vegetation had changed from his youth, the rocks and the river at this location had not. "It is a relief to see something that I can actually recognize! It makes me feel that this is truly the area where we grew up. Otherwise, it is impossible to see the old forest and clearings that we once knew. There are just too many roads, fields and houses around."

"I know. There are a few other places that are not much changed since way back then. And if you stand in certain places, the hills look the same."

The two of them sat on the rocky ledge, enjoyed the feeling and talked about that distant past. Finn had more memories of the region than his sister did because he had grown to manhood here, had hunted game with other village men and had fought in a few conflicts with the native people. Still, Rebekah had spent eighteen years growing up in the same village. Although she had been an adventuresome girl, most of her time had been spent doing "woman's work."

A noise coming from downstream to their right caught their attention. The breeze that stirred up fallen leaves was coming from that direction and carried the sound of boots tromping along and a man's voice singing a song. It took a couple of minutes before someone actually came into view along the path.

"It's a giant black man!" Finn said in surprise, but not loudly. "I saw some of normal size when I went shopping with Elijah. I've never seen so many and I was curious, but I didn't ask our brother about them."

"They're called African Americans now," Rebekah informed him. The man approaching was indeed dark-skinned and he was tall. She guessed he stood six foot seven or eight inches. A well-proportioned, lean fellow who probably excelled in basketball. He was listening to music coming from ear buds and was singing along with it. He didn't carry a tune well, Rebekah judged.

"There are many in this country?" Finn asked.

"Yes. Millions, I imagine. After the discovery of this continent by Europeans – other than we Vikings – many people were brought here from Africa and sold as slaves. Most of today's African Americans are descendants of those slaves."

Finn gave some thought to this as the big man approached. In the old days in Europe, men, in general, were short. He had seen giants a few times. They grew very tall, looked abnormal and didn't live long. This man coming toward them looked normal, but tall. He greeted them with a wide grin and good teeth. When he pulled the mini earphones out, he spoke and Rebekah thought his accent sounded like some New Yorkers.

While the siblings were concentrating on the newcomer, they didn't hear the three other men approaching quietly behind them until it was too late. Several gunshots rang out.

Finn was startled and started to turn around, but as he did he felt the sting of two things hitting his back, one right after the other. He didn't know what they were, but assumed that they were some sort of weapon. Then pain shot up and down his spine and his legs started to shake with weakness. He heard Rebekah yelp and curse and he looked at her, wanting to help and protect her. He saw something sticking out of her back and assumed it was the same as what was stuck in his back also.

Rebekah had moved, but not fast enough to avoid being shot with one of the tranquilizer darts the three men were firing. As pain went up and down her spine, she knew it was vervain. She and Finn, as Originals, had some resistance to the paralyzing drug, but as another dart hit her, she realized the double dose was going to leave her and her brother too weak to resist whatever was going to happen to them.

"It's vervain, Finn!" she told him as he collapsed on the ground with an alarmed expression on his face. "It won't kill us. Damn it! I can't believe this is happening." Unable to stand on weakened legs, she too collapsed onto the ground. Furious and helpless, she glared at the men who walked from between the trees. She and Finn had been set up, their attention distracted by the noisy approach of the fourth man and the rustling leaves.

Finn knew vervain as an herb harmful to vampires, one that could be put into food or drink. It had almost no scent and a bitter taste. On the serious side, it caused painful superficial burns on vampire flesh, plus weakness or paralysis of the muscles. A big dose caused unconsciousness, as well. He was not familiar with hypodermic syringes and needles or tranquilizer darts, but now knew that the drug could be administered in this fashion.

He was also not familiar with firearms, but had seen men shoot with them on the fantastic invention, the television. Klaus had explained what they were and how they were used. Finn was amazed at the power of gun powder to throw a projectile with such accuracy and at distances.

Now, he lay on the ground, the victim of both vervain and a firearm. Obviously, this projectile could carry a dose of the drug. So, here he was, helpless and at the mercy of the four giant Africans. Worse still, his sister was in the same situation. He feared for her and was frustrated that he couldn't help her. While he knew any number of things could happen to her (and himself), he was most concerned that she would be raped by their captors. She would certainly recover physically, but it was the mental and psychological effect that was longer lasting.

The same thought crossed Rebekah's mind, but she didn't worry about it specifically. She had lived a thousand years, much of it out of the coffin, and things had happened to her. She was mentally tough most of the time and could endure a lot. This situation itself was infuriating. That she had been careless and that she had put her brother in danger were what was upsetting her the most. Finn had dealt with people for less than two hundred years and all of that a long time ago. She thought he was ill-prepared to deal with these modern men and what they might do.

"What do you want?" she managed to growl as one of the men pulled the darts from her back. He then searched her clothing and removed her wallet, cell phone and comb. She seldom carried a purse.

"You'll find out soon enough, little girl," the man said. He gave her a smile. He took a minute to feel each of her breasts through her shirt and bra. "They feel real."

"They _are_ real," she snarled. "And get your damned hands off them." It was hard for her to talk because it was difficult to breath. A person needed to inhale and exhale air to speak.

"Like you're going to make me," he chuckled. "I'll take the girl," he said to his companions and in a moment he had scooped her up in his arms. There was nothing she could do except rest against his warm, muscled chest. He smelled of clean sweat and some sort of mild cologne that she liked. She berated herself for even noticing that. This was a dangerous situation. If she had had the strength to lift her head, she would have bitten the neck not far from her mouth. He seemed not to be worried about that possibility.

Still, to show she was not completely helpless, she produced her fangs and used one to scratch the part of his chest adjacent to her face. He jumped, swore at her and then laughed when the fang got hung up in the fabric of his shirt. She freed it by simply retracting it. A small amount of blood appeared on his shirt and she could smell it. She was reminded that she had not taken in a really nutritious amount of blood in quite a while. The small amounts she had taken from Mark had been tasty and had augmented the sexual feelings she had been having at the time, but that was all.

As the man holding her turned, she could now see Finn's situation better. One of the other men had the darts from Finn's back in his hand, while another man rolled him onto his back. The fourth man stood looking on, holding the guns they had used. Finn managed to swear at them in the old Viking tongue, but he couldn't move his arms or legs in defense or lift his head. The man who was searching for any weapon Finn might be carrying found none. He sat the Original up and with a strong heave, got Finn draped over his shoulder, head and arms hanging downward.

Again, Rebekah felt guilty about the situation, even though she really had no reason to feel that way. She hadn't known these men would come after them. She didn't know them at all. Were they after her specifically? Surely they didn't know Finn. He'd only been resurrected about thirty six hours ago. Perhaps the men had been waiting near the mansion and had followed them when they left. Perhaps they had wanted to catch any one of the family they could get. But why?

_A/N I'm trying to give more of Finn's background, although we really don't know a lot about him. If I contradict something already established, please forgive me. I hope you all like what I have written here so far. Things are going to get more interesting. Feel free to give a review._


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

She looked at Finn, carried by the tallest of the men, and he looked small by comparison. He was of average height for men of today. She had many memories of this brother, but all of them from a long time ago. He and Elijah were her oldest brothers. They had been teenagers when she was born and adults when she was still a kid. For this reason, she had always been closer to Niklaus and Kol.

Her mother had once told her she had had several pregnancies over the years, a couple that had ended with miscarriages or babies that had died soon after birth. Her first child to survive more than three or four years had been a girl called Freya, but she too had died. Even Rebekah's younger brother Henrik had failed to reach his teens. She and her four brothers were the ones who had lived.

Because Finn and Elijah were so much older, she had admired them as a child, but she had not spent a lot of time with them. However, Finn had spent more time with Esther than Elijah ever did, perhaps because Finn was so interested in magic. So was Kol, but Kol had been full of energy and spent as much time with the older boys and men as he could, learning to hunt and fight and to do men's work. And to get into mischief.

Rebekah also recalled that her father Mikael had often verbally reprimanded Kol for not actually doing real work if he could manage to avoid it. And sometimes he had reprimanded Finn for the same reason. Elijah often quietly did some of the tasks the others were supposed to do.

Niklaus and Rebekah had been close. She knew he had tried to do things to please his father and rarely succeeded. It had upset young Rebekah terribly at times that her father was so mean to dear Nik. The family, though close, had been dysfunctional to quite a degree. And to tell the truth, they still were.

Now, Rebekah eyed the four tall men as they left the area by the river and walked along the path toward where the car park area was. Finn, a little dizzy from the vervain and from hanging upside down, was unable to see his sister except when the man carrying him turned slightly. She seemed to be alright. He was glad his stomach was empty; otherwise he would have vomited down the big man's back.

"What do you want with us?" Rebekah managed to say to the man carrying her.

"Wait and see, okay?" Obviously, he was not going to tell her anything helpful.

They came to the parking area and went to a utility van. Except for the back

doors, there were no windows behind the front seats. Rebekah and Finn were deposited on the floor of the van, each of them too weak to do anything in their defense or to escape. Only two of the men got into the van, one driving and one in the passenger seat. They said nothing that helped the captives understand what was going on.

"Are you injured?" Rebekah asked her brother.

"No. Just paralyzed. This is most worrisome and frustrating. Are you alright?" When she nodded, he further asked, "Do you have any idea what is going on?

"Not at all."

"Do you know any of these men?"

"No."

Twenty minutes later, the van pulled to a stop after driving on the paved road and then on a dirt road. Rebekah tried to picture where they would be in the short drive. It had to still be in the Mystic Falls area. The rough dirt road had made Finn nauseated, but there was nothing in his stomach to come up. The van stopped and the two men stepped into the back part where they slipped cloth bags over the prisoners' heads. When the back doors were opened, Rebekah realized that she could see a little through the cloth. The prisoners were hauled out and carried as before, but this time to the porch of a house. The front door opened and Rebekah made out a man and a woman. They were both white people, but the man was as tall as the four other men. The woman was shorter, but not by much. She eyed the captives.

"Bring them inside," she said. Once inside the house, she removed the cloth bags, although the captives were not put down on the floor. "This is Rebekah, but this one is not the man I wanted." She reached for Finn's hair and moved his head so that she got a good look at his features. "Who are you?" she asked him.

He didn't say anything, but he wished he could sink his fangs into any or all of these tall people. He just glared at the woman.

"He was with the girl and he responded to the vervain the way she did, so he must be a vampire," one of the men said. "They left the house together, Kendra, so he must be staying there."

"He doesn't have any identification?" the woman asked.

"He had cash on him, but nothing else. No driver's license. No cell phone."

"Alright. We'll see how he does," Kendra said. "Take them downstairs."

"What is going on?" Rebekah hissed. "Who are you? What do you want with us?"

"Just some fun and games," the woman said with a grin. "I want to see how you do. Both of you. As for what else I want, you'll find out later."

This didn't sound good to either Rebekah or her brother. Were they going to be tortured? Which of the other brothers had she been expecting? And why? Had Niklaus done something to these people and they wanted revenge? Or was it Elijah the woman had been expecting?

The place seemed to Rebekah to be an old farmhouse, of which there were quite a few in the area. Despite suburban development, there were still farms here and there and some still had their old houses. The stairs going down to the cellar were narrow and the men carrying the prisoners had to take care going down. Rebekah was surprised to find that one half of the space was converted into a recreation room, while the other half was devoted to the furnace, a work shop, a laundry area and a storage area.

It was the recreation part that was fascinating because it not only contained a pool table and some gym equipment, but also a large, fancy doll house sitting on a low table. It occurred to Rebekah that there must be a young girl at the house. Then she noticed the candles on the cellar floor and the circle and pentagram drawn there. That was not good. Someone practiced magic here. She didn't feel any better about it when she and Finn were laid down on the floor in the center of the circle.

"Is that a doll's house?" he asked her. He was lying on his side facing his sister, but he could also see the fancy house. "I remember seeing something like that in the home of a wealthy family." While in Europe, before his brother had daggered him, he had seen some amazing things. There had been times when he and his brothers were considered gentry or high in social standing. They had been invited into fine homes and this was where Finn had seen a large, fancy doll house built for the young daughters of the family.

"It is," Rebekah agreed. "There must be a child here. This is not a good environment for a kid." A thought crossed her mind and she tried to ignore it. Hadn't there been a book or two and a movie about a prisoner put into a doll house? She didn't mention this to Finn.

"I'll go ahead with the spell," Kendra said.

"Wait a minute," one of the men said. "I think we should have fun with these two first."

"Sounds good to me, Merrick," one of the others said with a grin. "Let Clive have the dude. It's his thing. Me, I want a bit of the little blonde bitch." He reached for Rebekah's foot and started to drag her from the circle.

The one apparently called Clive grinned and bent over Finn. "You ready for a little fun?" Clive asked the silent man, his hand roving between Finn's legs.

Finn glared up at him. Finn was not inclined toward sex with a male, so he didn't want any intimate contact with this giant man. He also assumed that the man might have large private parts which could cause considerable pain and injury if used the way Clive likely intended. In addition, the brother didn't want such a thing to happen to him in front of his sister. Needless to say, he also felt frustration and anger over the fact that his sister was going to be raped and he was helpless to prevent it. He tried to move, but for the most part, the vervain had not worn off sufficiently. He could wiggle his fingers and toes and he could breath more deeply. He called Clive a few profane names. Clive pinched him where it didn't feel very good.

"No!" Kendra said with authority. " Leave them alone! You boys will _not_ do that. I didn't have them brought here for that."

"Damn, Kendra," Clive grumbled. "Come on! Give us a few minute to have some real fun. How often are we going to have vampires captive and helpless. And this one an Original!" He nudged Rebekah's knee.

The other men, including the white man, agreed, but Kendra again said, "No. I mean it. Center them in the circle again."

Rebekah realized that the woman had real authority here. She was the boss. Was it because she was a witch and they were afraid to go against her wishes? Rebekah hoped so. That didn't mean that Kendra didn't have something nasty in store for the captives, but at least rape was not one of them. Not yet, anyway.

Two of the men roughly repositioned the captives in the center of the circle and Kendra lit the surrounding candles with a wave of her hand. She then closed her eyes and began to chant.

Rebekah was now able to wiggle fingers and toes and breath deeply also. She could turn her head and she looked at Finn, finding him looking at her.

"I'm sorry I got you into this," she said to him.

"I don't see that it is your fault, Rebekah. What do you think she has in mind?"

"I don't know, but there is the doll house that …"

Her answer was cut short by a sudden feeling of dizziness, nausea and a sharp wave of pain that rippled through her body. Her vision faded, as did the voices of the men speaking. Then there was silence, except for some sharp breathing. She could see again, but now there was something covering her. Had someone thrown a tent over her and Finn?

"Finn?" she called in a small voice that sounded odd to her ears.

"I'm here. Where are you? They covered me up."

"Me, too. Your voice sounds different. Are you hurt?"

"No. I'm alright, but your voice sounds different, also."

"The vervain has almost worn off. I can move," Rebekah said. "I don't have my clothes on anymore. Damn, they undressed me!"

"Looks like they did the same to me. You were not assaulted, were you?" he asked.

"No. Were you?"

"No. What is this material they have covered us with?" he asked.

Rebekah looked around, managing to sit up and pushing upward on the material. There was more than one kind. One thing caught her eye. It was a pale blue lacy material edged with rope like macramé. Then it dawned on her that it bore a strong resemblance to the lace panties she had been wearing. She reached out to something hard and found that it was a large shoe. One of her shoes!

"I know what she did, Finn! She _shrunk_ us. All this cloth is our clothes!"

_A/N The plot thickens. Are they going to be put in the doll house? I hope you all like how this is going. Any suggestions?_


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

_A/N Disclaimer: I also do not own the "Barbie and Ken dolls." Kendra and the tall men are mine._

Finn muttered a curse as he examined the fabrics lying over and around him. He saw that one of them was the shorts he had been wearing. As Rebekah had, he found one of his shoes, now huge. He could have sat in it.

A booming voice above them laughed. "You figured it out. Good for you," came Merrick's voice.

The big humans began to remove the layers of cloth until finally the two captives were exposed. They felt really exposed due to the fact that they were nude. Finn could easily hide his groin area with his legs, but Rebekah defiantly made no attempt to cover herself. She was not that self-conscious and she knew she had a good figure. However, she was not used to being in the nude in front of Finn.

Both Originals made an attempt to move away in a blur, but there was still enough vervain in their systems to prevent that. They did manage to scramble away like mice. There were quite a few things around to get under or behind. The closest to Rebekah was a bookcase and she skittered out of the circle, past a giant candle and under the lowest shelf.

"Don't let them get away!" Kendra yelled. "There's a million things they can hide under."

Finn had made it to a thin space between an old rusty file cabinet and a waste bin. He could see that he could work his way toward the wall where there was a space behind the file cabinet. He was not as small as a mouse. More like a squirrel, he guessed, but he could hide behind a lot of things. But then what? He didn't know where his sister was, but it sounded like she was hiding, too.

By listening to what the big people were saying, each of the siblings knew the other was still free and hiding. As they moved around and hid here and there, they were in danger of either being stepped on or crushed by stuff that the humans were shifting as they searched. Finn didn't want to reveal exactly where he was by yelling to his sister, but he made a couple of small squeaking sounds, not that different from a mouse. He was relieved to hear an answering squeak or two.

"They're talking to each other!" Kendra said.

"Or that was just a couple of mice," someone else said.

"Damn it!" Kendra fussed, "I didn't expect them to be able to move that much that soon."

"If they get into the wall, we'll never catch them," one of the men muttered to the others.

"All right. We know they are down at this end of the cellar," Kendra said. "Block off the other end with boxes. Then we'll move stuff until we find them."

Both Rebekah and Finn wondered if there were mouse holes in the wall. If so, they could hide behind the paneling. So far, neither of them had come across mouse droppings, but they couldn't tell each other that. They were on their own, trying to avoid capture.

Several minutes went by as the tiny beings successfully scooted from one location to another. Finn squeezed into a space behind a box and then realized that he couldn't escape without backing up. Someone with a huge hand grabbed one of his feet and pulled him from his spot. He was caught. He found himself dangling high in the air with Merrick grinning at him.

"Caught ya!" the man said, grinning. He used his other hand to grasp Finn around his torso. "I got the guy. Ken. Little Kenny. Good name for you, since you don't want to tell us your real name. Look what I got, Kendra. Your Kenny doll."

Rebekah could hear the conversation perfectly from her hiding place. It upset her that Finn had been caught. As far as she could tell, Kendra intended to put her and Finn in the doll house. They would be like the famous dolls Barbie and Ken, only they were smaller. Rebekah was sure she was not eleven inches, which was Barbie's height. Besides, what she had seen of the doll house told her that it was made for a doll that was about five to six inches tall. It was a big structure, but not big enough for the standard Barbie.

Finn was not happy about his situation, of course. He let his fangs down and bit the huge hand holding him. He hoped not to be dropped to the hard floor. It would not have mattered if he had been fully recovered, but he was not yet. He would likely break a leg or something and then his chances of hiding successfully would be hampered.

Merrick swore at the tiny man who had bitten him and he then flicked a hard finger at Finn's forehead. The blow rocked Finn's head back and knocked him unconscious. Blood started to flow from his nose, mouth and one ear.

"Damn, Merrick!" Clive said. "You killed him!"

"What?" Kendra demanded, shocked. "Let me see." She eyed the little man and carefully lifted his head which was bleeding onto Merrick's thumb. "I don't think he's dead. Or he won't be for long. Vampires are quick healers. Be careful with him. Put him in the house on one of the beds. No, put him on the floor. I don't want the bed linens bloodied."

Rebekah listened to all this conversation. Finn was seriously hurt! They were going to put him in the house. From where she was, she could see the ornate front door. She also knew the whole back of the house was open at this time because the two panels that formed the back wall were on hinges. Looking up at the house from her vantage point, she spotted the hinges at the corners of the front wall. It too opened into two panels, like opening a cabinet, thus revealing the front rooms. The toy house was big enough to have front and back rooms and two stories. A staircase connected them.

The interior was a bit dark, presently getting its lighting from the bright cellar lights. She wondered if the fancy miniature house was wired with electricity. Indecision gripped her. Should she surrender so that she could go to Finn or should she continue to hide and hope to rescue him? And even if she did remove him from the house, what then? Where could they go? How long would the spell last that had shrunk them?

He would soon heal, regain consciousness and be free to roam the doll house. So far, there seemed to be no force field around the house to keep him in, but that could change. If both she and Finn were in the house, she was sure the witch would erect a force field. Either that, or the house could be locked tight.

As the giants went back to moving boxes and items from the recreation area to the furnace end of the cellar, Rebekah knew she would soon be discovered.

_What should I do? _she wondered_. Decisions, decisions. Make up your mind, Rebekah. I want to go inside and check on Finn. But how? Wait a minute! Is that an electric cord running up the side of this stand and into the house? _

The stand was about the height of most coffee tables in living rooms, but it was square, wide enough for the apparently-square doll house. The upper space under the stand was boxed in. Seeing that no one was watching at the moment, Rebekah ran to the cord and quickly climbed upward, coming to the top of the stand. Because the end of the rec room beyond the little house was already cleared, no one was there to see her pressed against the clapboard siding.

She touched one of the windows and found not glass, but strong clear plastic. She pressed on part of it and it did not give. _How can I get inside? The front door?_ Watching the people move furniture and other things, she saw her chance and ran to the door. _Does it open? Yes, it does!_

Rebekah was not sure what the scale of the house was. She herself, when barefoot, was five feet six inches. As she eased through the doorway and closed it, she guessed that it was equivalent to a door six feet six inches or seven feet tall. She found herself in the foyer, that appeared to be two-story with a chandelier hanging high above her. The house interior was presently lit by the cellar lights. It was a relief, in a way, to be in a place that was appropriate for her present size.

She moved to the stairs and tested her weight on them. She was small, but she still had some weight. The steps seemed firmly in place and barely made a sound. She hurried up to the landing above. The door to a bathroom stood wide open to the opened back of the house and she was exposed. Luckily, no one was looking at the house. She could see into one of the bedrooms to her left and spotted her brother lying on the floor. Ducking down to be less obvious, she went into the room and knelt down behind the bed. Peeking around the foot of the bed, she could see the lower half of Finn's body laid out on a rug. Feeling embarrassed on his behalf, she wished she could cover him with something. She knew she couldn't. If any of their captors saw him covered, they would know she was in the house.

"Finn?" she whispered.

He didn't answer. She couldn't go to him while the giants were still busy, moving around the room. She couldn't hear his heart beating or any breathing, but she knew by his skin that he was not really dead.

"Kendra, we gotto go," Merrick said. "We got practice."

"I need you here. We need to find Rebekah," the woman ordered. "That's more important than any basketball practice."

"She ain't going nowhere," one of the others said. "As long as she's little, what can she do? Our practice is important. _Four _of us are here. We need to go."

"Besides, she'll come out sooner or later for food and water and to check on Kenny," another man said.

"She's a _vampire_, not a _kitten_," Kendra snapped. "She doesn't need food or water. She might keep close to check on him, though."

Rebekah heard footsteps approaching the house and she flattened herself on the floor behind the bed. She hoped no one looked in the window near where she lay, because if they did, they would spot her. Or maybe not, since the room was shadowed.

The room darkened more as a new shadow was cast into it. Rebekah could hear the breathing and the heartbeat of the person.

"He's still out. His brain is probably scrambled," the big woman said, irritated.

"He bit Merrick. It's a wonder the little guy's body wasn't crushed in Merrick's fist."

Rebekah was sure the man speaking was the white man who had been at the house when they had arrived. Maybe he was the woman's husband.

"I suppose you're right, Ron." The woman sounded frustrated.

Something caught Rebekah's eye. As she lay as flat as possible close to the bed, which was covered by a tiny quilt that hung almost to the floor, she spotted something under it.

Carefully, she reached underneath and grasped what looked like a simple golden ring. She pulled it out from under the bed and looked at it. Because it was tiny, she knew it must have been worn by someone who had been miniaturized as she and Finn now were. The engraving read "Shelley, I will love you always. Bill."

_A/N Is someone else in the house? What does Kendra want with her "dolls"? Any suggestions? Thanks to _Obsess With Elijah_ for all the comments._


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Rebekah wondered, _Does the engraving on this ring mean Bill or Shelley might be in the house, too? Or does it mean one or both of them have been here, but now are not? What has happened to them?_

She slipped the ring onto one of the fingers of her right hand. It was not surprising that it fit her ring finger. Why had the ring shrunk down when the clothing had not?

The two giants moved away from the house and to the stairs. Rebekah heard one of them go up to the cellar door and open it. "I'll be back later," the man said.

"Alright. I'll be here. I intend to find the little bitch."

Rebekah whispered Finn's name again and he groaned. "Be quiet, Finn. Don't move. Pretend you are out cold. Do you hear me?"

"Yes," he whispered back.

She could see part of him by looking under the bed and out the other side. The most she could see were the parts in contact with the floor – his shoulder, his arm and hand, his leg. There was a small smear of blood on the rug under his head. She figured that if he was now conscious, he was healed, for the most part. He probably was still bruised.

"Rebekah!" the woman said loudly. "If you do not come out right now, I am going to cast another spell which will make you the size of a one-year-old baby. A normal-sized one. You won't be able to hide and you may even get injured. Do you understand me?"

It occurred to the captive that if she were suddenly that big, she would destroy the doll house and perhaps crush Finn. If she ran out of the doll house and back to the floor, she would be caught when the spell was cast. Hell, she would be caught either way. Even if by some chance she escaped from the cellar when she was bigger, where would she go? What had been done with her cell phone? Was there a land line phone somewhere in the house? If not or if she couldn't find and use it, what good would it do? Last but not least, she didn't want to leave Finn.

Out of curiosity, she attempted to move into vampire mode. To her relief, the fangs came down and her eye sight changed. She was still a vampire. She let the effect change back to normal. Making a decision, even though she was not sure it was the right one, she stood up and walked past the bed. She looked down at her brother's face and found him looking up at her. Neither of them said anything. He had heard what the woman had said and recognized his sister's decision.

She walked to edge of the room, facing outward. "I'm right here, Kendra." She spoke loudly, but her voice was small.

Still, the woman heard her, turned to face the doll house and grinned at her. "Smart decision on your part, my dear. Would you like something to wear? And something for your friend?"

"That would be a nice start," Rebekah said.

"I just happen to have a couple of these. I believe they are about your size." The woman took something from her pocket and laid it on the bedroom floor close to Rebekah. "Try one of them on."

Rebekah reached down and pulled at the fabric. She found that the green, silky cloth she had picked up had been folded into two layers, sewn down each side, open at the bottom and a hole at the top edge. It was wide and looked like a caftan. She slipped the open end over her head, poked her head through the top hole and found that there were two arm holes. The silky fabric draped awkwardly over her tiny body and down around her feet. It was comfortable and covered her nudity.

"Looks nice on you, dear," Kendra said with a smile.

Rebekah said nothing, but she picked up the other garment and went to Finn.

"I suppose you might like to get dressed," she said to him. "You never did strike me as the exhibitionist type."

"I definitely am not. Please lay that thing over me so I am decently covered."

Rebekah spread the fabric out so that it covered him from his toes up to his arm pits, then she knelt beside him.

"How do you feel?" she asked him. She didn't think he looked well, not with blood on his face and neck. He had a nasty bruise on his forehead and traces of "black eyes."

"I have a mean headache, ringing in my ears and my nose is clogged."

"Whatever he did to you fractured your skull. Take it easy until you're more healed."

"I can get up." He tried, but dizziness made him settle back.

"Stay flat for a little while longer," Rebekah urged. She looked up at Kendra, who was now sitting on a chair and watching what was going on. "I could use some water to clean up … Kenny." She waved a hand in Finn's direction.

"Speak up, dear. Your voice is very small."

Rebekah repeated herself in a louder voice.

"I can get you some. What is his real name?"

"Actually, it's Kenneth," Rebekah said. She didn't know if Kendra was aware that one of the Mikaelsons was named Finn, but she decided not to tell his name.

"Didn't I hear you call him something else?"

"Finny? His last name is Finster."

"He's your lover?"

"No. We've known each other for ages. He's in town and I invited him to stay at my brother's house." Rebekah was concerned that she would forget the details of this lie. That was the trouble with lies, even if they were partly true.

"I can give you water. The sinks, tub and toilet have real drains, but there's no running water. I'll give you a container of water," the big woman said. She waved a hand over the house before she walked away.

Rebekah looked down at her brother and said, "We have to assume there is some sort of bubble over the doll house that will keep us confined in here."

"I don't think I have the strength yet to seek escape," Finn admitted, pressing his hands to his aching head.

Kendra returned in short order with a plastic food container that was really about four inches wide and four tall, but it seemed much larger to the miniaturized siblings. She reached into the open edge of the room and moved the chest of drawers to one side to make more room for the container. It was almost full of water. In addition, she put two buckets beside it, ones that were tiny in her large hand, but the right size for Rebekah.

"In the bathroom there are wash cloths and towels. This water is clean and you can drink it if you keep it clean."

Finn sat up slowly and felt less dizzy. He lifted the "caftan" and slipped it over his head and down to cover his lap. With his sister's help he got to his feet. A little unsteady, he held onto her arm. His hands had some clotting blood on them from touching his head, so he smeared some on his caftan and on her arm.

"Let's go in the bathroom and clean you up," Rebekah said as she used a bucket to dip some water from the plastic tub.

The bathroom was next door to the bedroom. In fact, it was located between two bedrooms at the back of the house. At present, it's back wall was gone because of the house's whole back wall being open. Obviously, under those conditions, there was no privacy in the bathroom. Kendra was watching her little people closely.

Finn sat on the toilet's lid because there was nowhere else to sit. The room contained a bathtub against the back wall (which was not there at the moment), a sink, a counter and a toilet along the left hand wall. There was a mirror over the sink. The right wall had cloth towels on racks, an open cabinet with more bathroom supplies, a hamper, and there were fuzzy mats on the floor. There was no shower head above the tub and no shower curtain.

Rebekah was surprised to find a little stopper to put in the sink drain. She put it in place and poured some water into the sink from the bucket she had filled. The water was cold, but Finn didn't complain when his sister wet a cloth and began cleaning his face.

"You're getting a couple of black eyes and you have one hell of a bruise on your forehead."

"I am not surprised. I'm lucky my whole head didn't come off when he hit me," Finn muttered. "But I did get to bite him."

"Good for you. Your hair's full of blood. It needs to be shampooed. Preferably before the blood dries in it. I don't see any shampoo. What kind of hotel is this, Kendra?" This last she yelled up at the woman peering closely into the bathroom.

"There's a bar of soap. Use that," the woman said.

Finn muttered, "I feel like we're animals in a zoo having their behavior observed. Let me kneel down by the tub and hang my head over." He did this and remained silent while his sister poured cold water on his head and successfully washed the blood from his hair.

She had never known him when he was a child and there were no pictures, still she suspected that he had been somewhat blond, although now his hair was a light-to-medium brown, darker than Klaus' hair, which was now dark blond.

While Finn watched red water run into the tub and down the drain, he noticed that the faucets and drain hole looked very detailed. He ran one of his hands along the edge of the claw-footed tub.

"This tub is real," he told his sister.

"What do you mean?" she asked as she poured more water onto his head to remove the soap.

"I'm no expert on modern bathtubs, but I'm sure these metal taps are real. I think the tub was miniaturized." He sat back on his heels as Rebekah handed him a towel to dry his hair and face.

"Kendra has some powerful magic if she made all the furnishings in this house from real ones," Rebekah said in a voice soft enough that only he could hear. She fingered a corner of the striped towel Finn was using. It was pink in some areas now because she hadn't removed all of the blood from his hair. But more importantly, she saw that it was indeed a terrycloth fabric. Did anyone make tiny terrycloth towels?

She moved over to the sink, pulled the plug and let the remaining water run down the drain. She saw that the fixtures also appeared to be real. Opening the door to the cabinet under the sink, she saw the drain pipe with its U-shaped trap and the small pipes that would normally provide water to the faucets. The drain disappeared into the wall, which had to be hollow like in a real house.

"You're right. Look at the pipes under here," she said.

Finn did look. "Elijah showed me ones just like that in the bathroom in my room at Klaus' house. And also the workings inside the toilet tank. I wanted to know how that worked." He moved to the toilet, which did have a ceramic tank, and lifted the ceramic lid. Sure enough, the workings were all there.

"Too bad the water supply isn't hooked up," Rebekah said, looking into the empty tank. "We'll have to use water from the bucket to flush."

"You realize that with the back of the house open, one does not have privacy in here," he pointed out.

"I don't mind if it's just Kendra, but I don't want those other guys watching."

"I don't want any of them watching me pee," Finn muttered. "Or using that nice soft paper on my derriere. I wonder who thought to put it on a roll." Such a thing was right there near the toilet.

"I don't know, but it's convenient," Rebekah said. "Kendra has paid attention to the smallest details. Except for the water supply. Still and all, none of this makes the house any less a prison."

"Very true," Finn agreed.

_A/N I suppose a doll house like this would be expensive and a collector's item. I love the tiny furniture made for realistic doll houses, which, by the way, I don't have. I hope you all are liking this story. I'm working on the next chapter already. Thank you all for reading and following the story._

_A._


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Rebekah looked at the towel cabinet and spotted what looked like a real hair blow dryer. She picked it up and searched for an electric outlet. Seeing one, she plugged in the unit and turned it on. She saw Finn jump a little when it whined and blew air at him.

"Hold still. This thing is meant to blow one's hair dry."

"I think I'll just let it dry naturally," he said, eyeing the contraption.

"Modern times, brother," she whispered. "Just hold still and I'll dry your hair in no time." She saw him grit his teeth as she aimed the hot air at his hair. In a way it was odd to be doing personal things for a brother she hadn't see in nine hundred years. She fluffed his hair, which was short, despite his long sleep, and watched as it dried almost as light colored as Klaus' hair.

"There you go. All dry and fluffy. Go use that comb or brush we saw in the bedroom." She put the dryer away and followed Finn into the bedroom, which had pale yellow wallpaper with some sort of flowers on it. He picked up the comb, stared into the mirror and made his hair neat.

"I seem to have more hair than before," he commented.

"No, just fluffier," Rebekah chuckled. "Let's check out everything."

While in the bedroom she pressed down on the bed. She had originally thought it would be a hard plastic doll house bed with some cloth cover, but she found that it was soft. So, the bed mattress, sheets, pillows and blanket were all real ones that had been miniaturized. There were tiny casters on the bed legs. She hadn't considered the significance of that when she was hiding on the floor. Her attention had been on Kendra, the injured Finn and then the ring next to the bed leg.

"If all the stuff in this house was once real-sized, Kendra or someone spent a great deal of energy and time making them small," she said to her brother, who was opening one of the dresser draws. She was going to ask Kendra about it, but the woman had gone away.

"There's nothing in these drawers, and just the brush and comb and a hand mirror on the top here. Did you use this brush?"

"No. Why?"

"There's a yellow hair in it. A long one. A woman's."

Rebekah came to look closely at it. She then raised her right hand and showed him the ring. "I found this under the bed. It's from Bill to Shelley. I wonder if Shelley was here and where she is now."

"One hesitates to consider what might have happened to her, but it certainly could have been foul play."

Both of the siblings sniffed the air. There wasn't even the faintest hint of a dead body in the house. The only scent of blood was coming from Finn.

Kendra now returned and looked into the doll house to see what her "dolls" were doing. Without a word, she reached in and grasped Finn, lifting him up and out of the house and holding him at eye level.

"Are you her boyfriend, Kenneth?" she asked.

"No. Rebekah already told you that," Finn said, squirming a bit in the grip of the huge hand. The large thumb was across his chest and upper abdomen. He considered biting, but decided he couldn't chance another injury.

"Would you like to be her lover?" Kendra smiled at him.

"No! We're just friends. I have someone who loves me, but she is not here." He found himself thinking for a moment about Sage, a woman he had made into a vampire a long time ago and the one he loved.

"How do you know you would not enjoy sleeping with Rebekah?"

"I don't intend to find out," Finn said firmly. He could not think of a way the giant woman could force incest on him and his sister. He certainly knew Rebekah was a lovely woman and, had she not been his sister, he would have been interested.

To his dismay, Kendra lifted his caftan and inspected his lower body, gently prodding him with a finger from her other hand.

"You look okay. Are you really gay?" Kendra asked.

"I am not _happy_ with this situation. Surely you do not expect otherwise," he snapped, indignant with this touching. He kicked at her finger as he muttered old Viking profanities.

"Very funny. I meant homosexual. Are other men to your liking?"

"No," he said, now understanding. How had the word "gay" come to mean that instead of happy and joyous? Again, there were so many words he didn't know the current meaning of.

"I am interested only in the lady that I love. I prefer that you respect that."

"I'll think about it, little man," Kendra said, letting his caftan cover him again. Changing the subject, she asked, "Why didn't you have a cell phone on you? Everyone carries one."

Because he had noticed that both Klaus and Rebekah sometimes looked annoyed at the interruption of conversations by the cell phones, he assumed they could be very aggravating.

"I don't like them. They interrupt what I am doing." He hoped that was really a logical explanation.

"You're right about that," Kendra agreed, "but I would be lost without mine."

Finn had to assume she did not literally mean "lost." There were a lot of expressions used in today's conversations that made no sense to him, but he knew that such usage of idioms was nearly as old as speech.

Rebekah had said nothing during this conversation. She had not decided what to do if somehow she had to be intimate with Finn, but now it seemed not to be a problem. She was relieved when Kendra set him back down inside the doll house bedroom, but she could see the fury in his eyes. She was aware that indignities had happened to each of her brothers at the hands of others when they were human or when they were undaggered by Klaus. She herself had not escaped abuse, but it was something that they all had put behind them. Finn, confined to his coffin much longer than the others, had had the least practice at forgetting. Klaus, forever roaming about and interacting with humans and others, had had his share of problems.

"Check out the house, dearies. Have you been downstairs?" Kendra asked.

"Not yet," Rebekah said. "All I did was come up the stairs from the downstairs hall. Did you miniaturize all this furniture?"

"Yes, but I did it by miniaturizing the whole house! That has taken several months. Don't you just love it?" Kendra said with pride.

"It's an amazing undertaking," Finn said, although he really didn't care what she had done or how long it took. He wanted to get out of the house and he wanted to be back to normal size.

"Why didn't you shrink our clothes when you shrunk us?" Rebekah asked. Although she didn't say so, she was impressed with what Kendra had done. Shrinking a person was one thing; shrinking a whole house was really amazing. Kendra was a stronger witch than Esther.

"I wanted you to be naked. It's interesting how people act when they are deprived of their clothes."

"Would you do our clothes now?"

"Not now. I will when I'm ready. Go explore the house."

Finn glowered at the huge human. He considered that both he and Rebekah could feed on her at this time and she wouldn't be affected at all. There was no chance of his doing that at this moment. He followed his sister out into the upstairs hall and into a second bedroom at the front of the house. Like the one they had been in, this one had the same furniture, but of a different style. The wallpaper was different, as were the drapes. There was a nice leather chair next to a small table with a reading lamp. He suspected the miniturized lamp worked. Looking at the wall paper and bedding, he thought of this one as the "blue room." The back bedroom they had been in was more of a yellow room. Neither room had a closet, but had a wardrobe instead.

"Look at that," Rebekah said, pointing to a small round, black area on the upper part of one wall.

"What is it?"

"If I'm not mistaken, it's a camera. It's connected to a monitor. Like a television. There is probably a camera in every room so they can watch us."

"So, we have no privacy anywhere even if the house walls are closed?"

"Right. We could cover or damage the cameras, but I don't know that it is worth the trouble. Anyone can just look in the windows."

"There are drapes."

"What good would it do when the big walls can be opened? I saw hinges on the front wall like those on the back wall."

"Then we must accept that we are being observed most of the time," Finn said with grunt.

They found that there were two other bedrooms on the other side of the hall and stairway. One of them was a nursery with furniture for a baby or small child. The other, with interesting posters on the wall, was for an older child. Neither room had toys or clothing for a child.

With their caftans flapping around their legs, the siblings went down the stairs.

"Do you think the others will start looking for us?" Finn whispered. "Did you tell them where we were going?"

"I didn't say where we were going. I assume after a while one of them will try to phone me or text. If I don't answer for hours, they will wonder were we are."

"There is no way for them to find us."

"Not if my phone is turned off. It has a GPS which signals where it is."

"How long have these phones been around?" Finn asked as they reached the foyer with its front door. The little instruments were just one of innumerable inventions he found incredible.

"Not long. Before cell phones there were communication things called walkie talkies and ham radios. And regular phones connected to phone lines, of course. Those things have been around maybe a century. Telegraph lines were used about a century and a half ago. I'm not sure of the dates. For us long-lived vampires, that is not a long time."

"That's true. I've missed so much, Rebekah. Wonderful inventions! The whole world is different now." He knew he was repeating himself, but he really did feel both amazed and cheated.

"I know. It wasn't fair of Nik to leave you in the coffin all this time. Did you do something to anger him way back when?"

"I suppose so. It's between him and me. Don't ask."

"Okay. Fine."

Although she was saying it was fine, he guessed it was not alright because of some sarcasm in her tone of voice.

They went into what was obviously the living room, which was located in the front of the house. Even Finn was impressed with the furnishings and he found that the books on the shelves were real. He hoped to have time to read some books, but not in this fancy prison.

"There is a fireplace," he said. "Do you think we could build a fire?"

Rebekah came to look closely at it. "No. This is not for a real fire. It is fake, but it probably puts out heat. It runs on electricity."

"What does one do if something happens to electricity? Much seems to depend on it."

"One resorts to candles or lamps that are powered by batteries."

"Batteries?"

"Little things that provide electricity for a short period of time. The cell phones run on built-in batteries. They have to be recharged to keep working."

"If you say so," Finn muttered, shaking his head. He needed to remember all these things. Luckily, he had a good memory. "I think that my head is going to get too full of all this new information."

"I know what you mean. Every time Nik undaggered me, time had passed and I had new things to learn."

"Why didn't you just stay far away from him so he couldn't do that to you?"

"It would have been the smart thing to do, but I always felt close to him. We had adventures and he sort of looked out for me."

"He certainly did. By storing you in a coffin when he felt like it," Finn said with a snort.

_A/N Our miniature vampires are not making much progress in escaping. I hope you find the story interesting, even if there is no really exciting happenings so far._


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Finn stood by the fireplace and studied the painting over the mantel. It was of a hunt scene with a pack of hounds gathered around a scarlet-coated man on horseback.

"Do horses still exist?" he asked.

"Oh, yes. Plenty of them. People still like horses and do a lot of riding, some just for pleasure and some for horse shows, racing, other competitions."

"Not for work like in the old days?"

"There are still a few people who use horses for farming, ranching and for pulling tourist coaches in some cities."

The front wall of the house suddenly opened and Kendra looked into the living room.

"The television in this room works," she informed them. "It's not on cable, but it gets a few channels from the old antenna on my roof."

"I suppose that's better than nothing," Rebekah said, although she didn't intend to be around long enough to watch much television.

"The piano in the study works. I had it tuned recently."

"How?" Rebekah asked.

"A piano tuner, of course. Shrunk the man down to size and let him do his job. When he was done, I made him big again. And you vampires are not the only ones who can make a person forget what happened. Do either of you play?"

"Not me," Rebekah said, although long ago she had learned to play a little on a harpsichord.

"Me, neither," Finn assured the woman.

"Too bad. I may have to find someone who can play it."

"If you have done all this, why didn't you shrink down a plumber so we could have running water?" Rebekah asked.

"Too much danger of flood damage. Be careful, little ones. If you set fire to this house, you will die in it. I won't come to your rescue. I'll just have to shrink another house for some other guests."

The siblings looked at each other for a moment. Finn shrugged. He then followed his sister through a door to the room in back of the living room, putting them in the kitchen, which was fairly modern. Rebekah opened the refrigerator door and found that it was empty and not cooled.

"The fridge works if you turn it on. The stove works also," Kendra said cheerfully after coming around to the open back of the house. "There are dishes and flatware. Glasses. Pots and pan."

Rebekah hoped they would not be there long enough to consider preparing meals.

"I _am_ hungry," Finn told the woman. "Please be kind enough to put your hand in here so that we can have a bit of your blood." He didn't expect the woman to do that and she didn't.

"Maybe later," she said.

The room next to the kitchen was the dining room with a table for eight. The china cabinet held a very nice set of dinnerware. A small chandelier hung over the table. Rebekah looked around, searching for a light switch. Seeing a rheostat next to the door to the kitchen, she went to it and turned it on. The chandelier lit up and she adjusted the brightness.

"Nice, huh?" Kendra said with a grin.

The siblings could tell the woman was very proud of what she had done and wanted her captives to be really impressed. To flatter Kendra, Rebekah said, "Very impressive, I have to admit." Winning over the abductor sometimes led to better things, nicer treatment, chances of escape, perhaps.

"Kendra, could you please bring us a water supply for downstairs?" Finn asked. "We won't have to run upstairs for it."

The big woman reached into the bedroom, picked up the large water container, moved the small kitchen table away from the back wall and placed the container down in that area. It took up space and looked ugly there.

"I think the idea was to have two water supplies," Rebekah suggested.

"You are being lazy, my dear," Kendra said. "I'll think about it. Amuse yourselves. I have phone calls to make and lunch to prepare. I suppose you would like some food. Do you eat real food?"

"We do," Rebekah said. She watched the woman leave and go up the cellar stairs to the ground floor. Turning to her brother, she said, "Now we have to haul buckets of water up to the bathroom. Good move, Finn."

Again, he could hear her sarcasm. "Sorry. And I do need to use the bathroom. I'd like to do it while she is gone."

"Let's go see if there is a camera in the bathroom." She led the way upstairs and they looked for a camera. There was one and they saw no way to block it. "Take a bucket and get some water for the toilet," she said, not sure her brother would take orders from her.

He picked up the bucket they had used to wash his hair and headed downstairs. When he returned, he carried a full bucket.

"Pour some in the toilet bowl. After you are finished with whatever, pour more water in until the water in the bowl is clear. Okay?"

"Yes. What about the camera? Do you think Kendra is watching?"

"Maybe. You know, I have an idea." Rebekah wet her hands in the water and then picked up the chunk of soap. She got her hands soapy over the sink and then said, "Lift me up so I can reach that camera."

Finn lifted her up high enough that she could smear soap over the camera lens, then he put her down.

"That will blur the image to some degree. I don't know how much," she said. "Please pour some water on my hands." She held them over the sink again. If she had put her hands in the water in the bucket she would have contaminated it a bit, although she wasn't planning on drinking it. The idea was to keep the water as clean as possible.

After drying her hands on one of the towel, she said, "I'll be downstairs looking around." When she left the room, Finn closed the door behind her, even though the whole back wall of the bathroom was wide open. She went into the adjacent bedroom and walked to the edge of the room. Holding onto the sidewall, she reached out as far as she could. Her hand ran into an invisible barrier.

_I need to test this when Kendra puts her hand inside the house. The barrier must be down when she does that. Or it's a barrier just for us vampires._

She then went downstairs and looked in the fourth room, the one across the hall from the living room. It was the study, with more books, a small table with two chairs, plus a couple of recliners, other odds and ends and the piano Kendra had mentioned. Rebekah hit a couple of keys and found that the miniaturized piano had a small, tinny sound. The piano tuner must have had a hard time tuning it.

Going out into the front hall again, she was surprised by a large grandfather clock striking the hour, playing its chimes. She hadn't noticed the clock when she had entered the house, but it was here now and working, its pendulum slowly swinging back and forth. It showed the time to be noon, if it was correct. The whole morning had gone by!

There were no closets in the house, but she spotted a door under the staircase. It opened when she turned the knob, but if there had been stairs down to a cellar, there were none now. In fact, she could hear water running into a metal container somewhere under the floor.

_Finn must be finished in the bathroom, _she thought. She moved to look up the stairs at him as he came out into the hallway. "Did you notice any stairs going up to an attic?" she asked him.

"No, I didn't. I think I saw dormer windows in the roof when we were outside. There may be an attic that isn't accessible to us."

"I wonder why not." She wondered if something interesting was up there.

"If there is someone up there, they have not made a sound while we have been here," Finn said.

Rebekah went up to the landing and she and Finn looked more carefully at the layout of the rooms. What they discovered was that the wall between the two bedrooms to the left of the stairs hid something. The space could have been used for closets for each room, but that was not the case. There was a space there, apparently wide enough for a narrow staircase.

"I don't see any access door," Rebekah mused as she felt along the wall of the front bedroom. She came to the oak wardrobe and tried to move it, but it seemed fixed in place tight against the wall. She stood back and looked at it.

"This wardrobe is situated in an odd place," she told Finn. "Don't you think it would look better centered on this wall?"

"I agree," he said and he opened the wardrobe. Although it had a rod with hangers and also a couple of shelves, there was nothing in it. He tapped on the back wall. The sound was hollow. "I think our access to the attic is right here."

The siblings tried to find a way to open the back, but before they succeeded, all the lights went out, including those of the large cellar outside the house.

"Power failure or on purpose?" Rebekah wondered aloud. She and Finn had eyesight like a dog or cat, but they could see nothing in total darkness except for those items that put out heat. In this case it was the ceiling light fixture that had been on and was hot. Also, something outside the house glowed a bit.

"I suspect it is an attempt to dissuade us from finding the stairs," Finn muttered. "Why the secrecy? What is up there?"

"Or who?"

There was a thump above their heads and a groan. Someone was definitely up in the attic and had probably stumbled over something in the dark.

"Hello? Who is up there?" Rebekah called.

There was no answer.

"Maybe we can help you. Are you hurt?"

There was still no answer, but she was sure someone was there. "Do you hear a heartbeat?" she whispered to Finn.

"No. So, is it another vampire?"

""I wonder. Let's go downstairs," Rebekah whispered again. "If we get away from the wardrobe, Kendra might turn on the lights again."

With their caftans floating about them, they felt their way to the stairs and went down and into the kitchen. Taking seats at the wooden kitchen table, they waited in the darkness for Kendra to turn on the lights and return.

At the Mikaelson mansion, Klaus was annoyed. "Has Rebekah showed up yet?" As he sat down, he looked at each of the people sitting around the dining room table as lunch was being served.

"No, and she has not called or texted," Elijah said. "Where could she and Finn be?"

"With our sister, who knows?" Kol said with a shrug as he helped himself to some green olives with red pimento stuffed inside. He always had an appetite for almost any kind of food. Being a vampire, he didn't have to worry about his health. He was also happy that, despite being a vampire, he could eat and enjoy real food.

"It's not like her to fail to call back when we have tried three times to reach her. We should go out and look for her car," Klaus fussed, more irritated by the idea that Rebekah was being inconsiderate, rather than thinking she and Finn were in trouble. But there was always the possibility of the latter.

"Let us eat our meal first," Esther said. "I sense neither pain nor terror from her. Nor from Finn." She was able to do that to some extent, being a strong witch, but she had not been monitoring her children much since coming to the mansion. She tended to ignore any minor pains or fears. Right now she was hungry. She eyed the dishes of food the servants were presenting. How she had missed tasty food all those terrible years she had lain in her coffin! She intended to enjoy as much as was proper to do so.

"Alright, Mother," Klaus said. "After we have eaten, Elijah and I will each drive around and look for her car."

"I'll go with you, Elijah," Kol said. "You promised to teach me how to drive these new autos. Might as well kill two birds with one stone."

"What does that mean?" Esther asked.

"Accomplishing two things at one time," Elijah informed her.

"I see. Well, I think locating Rebekah and Finn is more important than Kol learning to control one of those machines."

"Not to me," Kol said with a grin. He saw no reason to worry about his two siblings at this point. In fact, he saw little reason to worry about them at all. He guessed that his sister was showing the local world to poor brother Finn, who had been "dead" for centuries. For Finn, everything in the world was different.

_A/N It appears that Rebekah and Finn are not the only people in the doll house. Who is in the attic? And will the other siblings find out where the captives are?_


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

The lights in both the big cellar and the doll house came on at the same time. Finn and Rebekah sat in the kitchen and watched out the open wall as Kendra came down the stairs from the first floor. She carried a plate of something. At the open back of the doll house she knelt down and looked at her two "dolls."

"Are you hungry for lunch? I brought sandwiches and iced tea. And chocolate chip cookies."

The woman held the plate she carried at the level of the little kitchen floor. The captives could see what was on the big plate. Everything on it was miniaturized, including the plates of food and the glasses of tea. Balancing the big plate on one hand, Kendra carefully pushed the little plates to the edge next to the kitchen.

"Help yourselves," she said.

Finn, being a gentleman, stood up, made his way around the water tub and went to the plate. Rebekah followed him and took the opportunity to reach out to see if the force field was in place, even though the edge of the large plate was an inch into the kitchen. Her hand met the field and went no further. She silently cursed, having hoped there was a chance of escape.

"You aren't leaving the house unless I take you out," Kendra said calmly.

Rebekah realized that she could probably have escaped when the woman had picked up Finn and held him outside the house. But what would she accomplish? Returning to her chair at the table, she watched Finn as he brought the plates of sandwiches and the glasses of tea to the table. He had put the cookies on the sandwich plates.

The sandwiches turned out to be a tuna salad and a peanut butter and jelly, one of each for each prisoner.

"What is this?" Finn asked, opening up one of the PB and J sandwiches.

Rebekah explained, adding, "An American favorite."

He took a bite, savored it and nodded. "Interesting flavor." He liked it and ate the whole sandwich. He also liked the tuna and mayonnaise sandwich. He sipped the provided drink.

"Sweet tea," Rebekah told him.

"It's good," Finn said, liking it also. This meal was simple, not like the big meals

provided at Klaus' mansion, but it was filling and interesting.

"Kendra, are we the only ones in this house?" Rebekah asked.

"Why do you ask?"

"We heard a noise upstairs."

"Oh?"

Rebekah suddenly felt that she should not have said that. What if some prisoner like them was hiding successfully? "I suppose it was just the water … Kenneth poured down the toilet. Where does it go?"

"A container under the house."

"This place is really quite clean," Rebekah commented. "How do you clean it?"

"A maid."

"Excuse me?"

"I have a woman come. I pay her well to let me shrink her so she can clean house. Afterward, I make her normal size. She keeps the secret."

"You must pay her _very_ well," Finn said.

"That, plus a few threats. She has a family."

"Nice," Rebekah said with a snort.

"People treasure their families, and parents often make sacrifices for their children," Kendra informed them. "Well, enjoy your lunch. I have to go grocery shopping."

The woman stood up and walked away with the larger plate.

"I'm not so sure I agree with what she said," Rebekah said softly to her brother. "What sacrifices did _our_ parents make? I don't trust Mother; and Father would be happy to sacrifice us to death."

Finn considered saying something that he knew about his siblings and was sure his sister did not, but he didn't say it. There was a secret that he had known just about all of his life, a secret he and his mother kept from the other siblings, one involving the little girl who had been his older sister when he was little. It was of no importance now.

"I think we should give Mother the benefit of the doubt," he said, using a term Elijah had used. "Except for wanting Father to kill us, she always had our best interests at heart."

"I suppose. Except for the part about sicking Father on us. A not-so-minor detail." Changing the subject, she said, "You've eaten everything on your plate. I take it you find today's cuisine acceptable."

"So it would seem," Finn said and he grinned at her. Then he went back to his usual serious expression.

Rebekah smiled at him. It was odd how he and Elijah were always so serious, while Niklaus and Kol seemed to laugh at everything – good or bad. The truth was that she had never found Finn's company enjoyable. He just was not a fun guy.

In a way, it was not surprising. He was the oldest of the siblings, barely two years older than Elijah. He was closest to Esther, as her oldest living child and her first-born son. He was, in fact, just old enough to be Rebakah's father, although, of course, he was not. The result was that he and his little sister had never had the same interests or friends. A long time ago, she had found him solemn and he had thought her juvenile. This time around, she was more mature in her attitude and much more knowledgeable while he was less confident. Now, she was getting to know him better than she ever had before, but this was not under good conditions.

"Do you want to see if we can get into the attic?" she asked.

"Yes. Something or someone is up there. If Kendra is not providing food and water, whatever is up there may be dying."

"Unless it's a vampire like us."

"A possibility."

Leaving their used dishes on the table, they went to the hall and up the stairs. From there they went into the front bedroom and to the wardrobe. Finn tried to move it, but failed. He and Rebekah tried to find a way through the back of the wardrobe, but again, that didn't work. Finn then tried punching a hole in the back with his fist. He broke a bone in his hand, but the wood held firmly.

Rebekah pulled on his broken finger to straighten the bone. Finn gritted his teeth and didn't say anything for a minute. The damage would heal quickly.

"Hello," Rebekah shouted. "Anyone up there? Please answer. Maybe we can help. There's no one here but me and my brother." She hoped that the spying cameras did not have audio, since she had just admitted that Finn was her brother.

There was no answer and no sound from above.

"Let's check the other room," Finn said and he led the way into the yellow bedroom.

"In this bedroom, the door opens against the wall, where in the blue bedroom the door opened the other way," Rebekah observed. "That is weird. In this room the wardrobe is just past where the door is when it's open. The other wardrobe is backed up to the wall in an odd place."

"And we can't move it. This wardrobe is not attached to the wall," Finn said, looking at the narrow space behind it. "So the other one must hide access to stairs to the attic." A secret stairway was not a new idea for Finn. A long time ago, he had been in mansions and castles that had them.

Rebekah knocked on the wall in the area in question. There was no sign there was a door. "I guess we could punch through this wallboard."

"And I could break another finger."

"I doubt it. This isn't wood like in the wardrobe. As far as I can tell, there is no stud right here." She was tapping on the wall.

"Stud? Walls now are male?"

"No! The wooden beams the wallboard is nailed to. And wallboard is not wooden either. This is also called 'drywall', and usually a man can punch a hole in it."

"I'll have to trust you on that. Alright, here goes." Finn slammed his left fist into the wall and his hand went right through. Then someone grabbed his wrist firmly and he could not withdraw his hand.

"What?" Rebekah asked, seeing a surprised look come to his face.

"Someone has hold of my arm!" he gasped. "Whoever you are, let go."

The grip didn't loosen. In fact, it tightened and was strong. Finn pulled back, leaning away from the wall. It did no good. Small bits of plaster and torn wall paper fell to the floor.

"Hold still," his sister said. She put her face next to his arm at the hole and carefully sniffed. She inhaled the scent of powdered gypsum and plaster, but she also smelled something else.

"Vampire," she whispered to Finn.

"You in there. Speak up. We are not the enemy. We are prisoners, too," Finn said.

The person did not answer.

"Okay," Rebekah growled. "I'm going to punch another hole in the wall. Which way do you think the body is? To the right or to the left of your hand."

"I think right."

Rebekah decided to make the new hole a few inches to the right of the hole. She had the strength to punch through the wallboard, but unfortunately, she hit one of the upright studs and smashed a couple of knuckles in her hand. She withdrew her hand, yelping and saying a few words Finn was sure were not polite.

Someone on the other side of the wall chuckled and the siblings were sure the person was male.

"Hold out your hand," Finn said. Rebekah did so and her brother used his one free hand to pull the damaged fingers and knuckles into alignment. Rebekah gritted her teeth and groaned at the pain, but helped with the situation by pulling back.

"Okay , you in there," she yelled. "If you don't want help, the hell with you. Let his hand go and we'll leave you alone."

For a long moment, nothing happened, and then the grip on Finn's wrist was gone. He quickly withdrew his arm from the wall. Rebekah took his bruised hand and sniffed where fingers had left red marks.

"Definitely male. Do you think it's Bill?"

"Is your name Bill?" Finn asked at the hole.

There was no answer and they thought they heard soft footsteps going up the stairs inside the secret space.

"So, someone is living up there," Rebekah muttered as she and Finn moved away from the hole and out into the hall. Both of them had some blood drying on their hands, so they went into the bathroom. There was a small amount of water left in the bucket and they poured it into the sink and washed their hands.

"Which set of towels do you want?" she asked. "The red-striped ones or the ones with roses?"

"Does it matter? I mean, do we have to claim one or the other?"

"It's customary. I'll take the ones with the roses. The other set is yours."

"You took those because mine are already wet and stained from when you washed my hair," Finn accused mildly.

"True. But there are more towels and wash cloths in that cabinet. Take out clean, dry ones. Leave the damp ones to dry on the edge of the tub. Maybe Kendra will take them. I wonder if she spells them into normal size in order to put them in the washer."

"I can't imagine that woman scrubbing dirty clothes," Finn said as he put new towels on the empty towel rack after his sister chose the other one.

"People in this country don't 'scrub' clothes, Finn. They put them in machines called washing machines. They don't usually hang them out to dry, either. There are other machines that dry them."

"All functioning with electricity, I suppose. Modern people are lazier than those of olden times. They have machines to do nearly everything."

"Yup, but that isn't true everywhere in the world, Finn. There are plenty of places left where people live much as we did at the time you remember. In fact, more simply than we did then and where women do hand-wash the clothing. Most of what you have seen here the last couple of days represents just one level of society. Well, two levels, actually."

"Klaus is rich."

"You can say that again. But he doesn't flaunt it like some do, except for that house and other properties that he owns. Kendra and Ron are middle class, as far as I can tell."

"Elijah told me there are no royal families in this country, which is supposedly a democratic republic. Whatever that really means. He said there are no strict class lines here."

"That's true," Rebekah said as they went downstairs to the study. "In this country, there are the very rich and the very poor and all sorts in between. The world is very small these days. By that they mean that with modern trade, communications, transportation and such, what happens on one side of the world can almost immediately affect the other side or anywhere. And with that cell phone that I was carrying, I could talk to someone in Thailand or Australia or South Africa."

Finn shook his head in wonder. "The world is so different now."

"Well, so much for discussing the socioeconomic situation of the world. The question here and now is: what are we going to do? We are stuck in this house and our family has no idea where we are."

"Add to that the fact that we are now about six inches tall. Oh, and there's a vampire in the attic," Finn said. "Life seems somewhat complicated these days."

_A/N Who is the vampire in the attic? Will he be friendly or not? Are the rest of the Mikaelsons getting any leads on the whereabouts of the two missing family members?_

_I hope you all find this story interesting. Please review._


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

"I don't know. Perhaps we should wait and see what opportunities come along. I'd like to look at some of these books," Finn said.

"Go ahead. I'm going to poke around and look at other things," Rebekah said, understanding her brother's desire to know about the world. She headed up the stairs again and went to the two rooms set up for children. Had Kendra brought a family here that had a small child or was it just that she had the furnishings and put them in the rooms? There was even a nice rocking chair and she sat in it. What would it be like to sit there holding an infant? She had held babies and small children, but they had not been hers. None would ever be hers. The only way she could have any descendants was to turn humans into vampires by using her blood. She would never turn an infant, sentencing it to forever be a baby. Even criminal vampires didn't do that.

While his sister prowled around, Finn went into the study. He was interested in the books, but he also noticed a round thing on a stand. He went to it and studied it closely. He was amazed to find that it was a map of the world, the whole world in its round shape. When he had been alive before, there had been arguments of whether the world was flat or round. He had not known if it was round, but his family did know there were lands far to the west. Now it seemed that people had figured out that it was definitely round. And look at all the countries! Amazing.

After spending some time in the nursery and the other child's room, Rebekah went downstairs and looked at her brother. He was sitting in a chair looking at large photographs in a large book, what some people called a "coffee table book."

"If we end up stuck in this house," he said, " I will learn much from books like this."

"If we end up stuck in this house, you will have no chance to see any of those places in person for quite a while. We have to do _something._ I can't stand doing nothing," she grumbled.

"And just what do you expect me to do?"

"We have a male vampire living in _our_ attic. Don't you care?"

"I suspect he's been there a while, so that means he has two vampires living in _his _house."

"Alright. So there are _three _vampires being held prisoner in _Kendra's_ house. I still think we should go up there and bash down the wall and confront him," Rebekah insisted.

"Kendra wouldn't like us bashing down walls in her doll house."

Finn's calm attitude annoyed Rebekah. She uttered a couple of curses.

"If you are so determined to wall bash, go have at it," the brother said.

"I will! I need to find something to use. The leg from a table might work." She went to an small table in the room, removed the vase sitting on it, and proceeded to wrench a leg from it.

Finn continued to sit where he was and he shook his head at her wanton destruction of a nice piece of furniture.

"What?" Rebekah said, daring him to voice what his expression said.

"Nothing." He watched his sister leave the study and heard her stomping up the stairs. He sighed. The chair he was sitting on was very comfortable, the lamp on the table beside him was on and the illustrated book he was going through was very interesting. Except for the few hours of sleep he had gotten in Klaus' mansion, this was the first time he had had time to relax in peace and quiet. It was nice, as long as he forced himself to forget that he was in this place against his will. He suspected that they could not escape, so he might as well take advantage of the few niceties provided. In addition, at the moment, nothing was hurting him. His headache was gone and his hand no longer hurt.

He heard Rebekah slamming the wooden table leg against the wall, and then he heard Kendra's angry voice.

"What are you doing?" the woman demanded. "Stop that! Why are you putting a hole in the wall?"

"There's a space behind the wall," Rebekah snapped. "I want to know why. What is in there?"

"None of your business. Come here," Kendra ordered.

"Put me down! Finn! Kenneth!"

Finn stood up and ran for the stairs. He reached the top landing in time to see that Kendra had Rebekah outside the house, held in a big fist.

"Please don't hurt her, Kendra. She is just impulsive." He had to yell in order for his little voice to be heard.

"And likes to play by her own rules," Kendra said. "Well, little lady, you are going into solitary confinement. 'Time out.'"

Finn watched as she took her naughty "doll" over to another table on which sat a large, open glass jar with a wide mouth, and dropped Rebekah into it. She then screwed on the lid.

Kendra then came back to look at Finn standing at the back edge of the yellow bedroom.

"You aren't going to knock holes in the wall, are you, Kenneth?"

"No, ma'am. How long will Rebekah be over there?"

"Until I feel like letting her out. What were you doing while she was ruining my doll house wall?"

"I was in the study. You have some excellent books there."

"Well, I'm glad you like them. Go back there and stay out of trouble." With that, the big woman turned and went up the stairs from the cellar.

Finn stood there looking across the space to the glass jar. He could easily see his sister and he assumed she could see him. The jar was probably a foot tall and fairly wide, so that there was quite a bit of room for Rebekah. There was nothing in it but her, standing with hands pressed to the glass and her eyes looking at him. He held up his hands in a gesture that meant "I can't do anything to help you." His expression said, _I'm sorry._

He wondered how he would feel if it were he in the jar. Besides getting motion sickness, he also had claustrophobia, the fear of being in a small, tight and closed area. He could see that the jar was moderately roomy, but it still made him nervous to see Rebekah in there. Although he had been "dead" for nine hundred years, he had been totally unaware during that time. It was a good thing, because if he had known that he was lying in a tight coffin, he would have gone completely insane. It made his stomach clench just thinking about it.

Despite the fact that the doll house was an elaborate prison, it was still a prison. Somewhat discouraged, he turned around and went back downstairs. In fact, he went back to the study and to the book, but now it was harder for him to relax and enjoy looking at the beautiful pictures of places in the world. The comfort he had felt a short while ago was hard to recapture, but little by little his tension eased.

The Mikaelson house was in an uproar. Two of the family members were missing. Rebekah's cell phone apparently was turned off. Her car had been located near Wickery Bridge and assorted large footprints had been found along the path that led beside the river. Something had happened at the rocky overlook. Had the siblings been attacked? Had they been taken prisoner? Why? Where were they? If they were being held for ransom or as leverage, someone would have called to make a deal. No one had done that.

Sheriff Forbes had been notified and her few people also searched along the river. At the scene of the struggle a tranquilizer dart had been found under some leaves and it contained vervain. A search was made from the bridge to the falls below the town in case the paralyzed victims had been tied up and thrown into the river, but no bodies had turned up. If vervained and just thrown into the river without being tied up, the siblings would have recovered and climbed out of the water. They would have shown up by now.

The angry, distraught family had to wait for someone to make the next move. Waiting was not easy. Klaus, a man of action, was like a caged lion.

Time passed and the tall clock in the doll house's foyer chimed out the hours. Ron returned to the big house, but he didn't go down to the cellar. Finn could hear his voice as he talked and laughed with his wife. Eventually, Kendra brought a plate of food for Finn for the evening meal, but nothing for the girl in the jar.

Rebekah watched the giant move around, talking to Finn. She hated the woman. She saw that food was brought to her brother, but none to her. It made her more angry. She also needed to empty her bladder. She had no choice but to hike up her caftan and urinate in her glass prison. The bottom of the jar was humped up a bit in the middle so that she was able to avoid the lower wet area. The aroma of urine, plus the scent of vinegar, stayed in the jar because there were no air holes in the lid. Rebekah was not worried about suffocating, because as a vampire she actually didn't need to breath unless she was talking.

In looking at the doll house from her vantage point she could see that there was indeed an attic space. There were even two dormer windows up there. While there were some lights on in the lower rooms, none showed from the dormer windows. Although Rebekah stared at the windows for a long time, she saw no sign of a person there.

Night must have come because Kendra came down to the cellar and closed the front and back walls of the little house, and when she left, she turned off the lights in the cellar. Only the little lights in the doll house remained on and showed through the windows. Rebekah wondered if Finn would turn out some of the lights or leave them on all night. And would he go to sleep in one of the bedrooms as if nothing was wrong? She didn't know him well enough to guess what he was feeling.

Because he had lights on in the house and nothing else to do, Finn looked at pictures in books and read as much as he could about this and that. He ran across a lot of words that he didn't know, but he still learned much. Now and then he went to the world globe to see where a country was located. He hoped that he would have the chance to travel, both in the Americas and in Europe. He was sure that in some of the countries, he would actually see old places that he would recognize. Then there was Asia and Australia to explore. He had to assume that he would have years to do that.

Eventually, he decided to get some rest and he went upstairs, leaving the light on in the study. He stood in the yellow bedroom for a few minutes, listening, but he heard no noises from the attic. Realizing that he wanted to use the toilet, but had no water, he took the bucket and went down to the kitchen for a refill. He looked at his empty plate and felt sorry for his sister. As far as he knew, Kendra had given her no food or drink. Looking out the back window, he could barely see the shape of the big jar, but he couldn't see Rebekah. It was too dark.

She saw his silhouette at the window, looking at her, she supposed. Then he apparently dipped a bucket of water from the big container in the kitchen and turned off the kitchen light. Soon she saw his shadow on the bathroom window and figured he was using the toilet again or washing his face. She was almost surprised when the bathroom light went out. And then so did the one in the yellow bedroom. He was being practical and not leaving lights on all night. Was he sleeping there in the back bedroom? Was he poking around in the hole in the wall? Or was he in the other bedroom, going to sleep on a comfortable bed? She felt considerable resentment. Stuck in her jar, she sat in the raised center and brooded until she finally got bored and sleepy and curled up where she sat.

At the Mikaelson mansion the family gathered around Esther as she attempted to find her missing offspring by using a locator spell and a map of Virginia. All this accomplished was to indicate that the two were in the Mystic Falls area. A further attempt made by using a map of Mystic Falls failed to pinpoint just where they were.

"I believe my efforts are being blocked," Esther said. "There's a witch involved in this, one with considerable power."

"Well, Mother, what do we do now?" Klaus asked in a sarcastic tone. He knew his mother had great confidence in her spell-casting expertise and it was vaguely amusing to him to see her efforts foiled. He did, however, want to rescue his siblings, so he felt frustrated by his mother's failure.

"At least we know they are nearby," Elijah said, looking at the bright side. He ignored the scowls of everyone else and the agitated pacing of Kol.

_A/N Another chapter done. This time of year is so busy with Christmas almost here. I wish you all Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. I hope everyone around the world has some happiness this season during whatever holidays you may be celebrating. Let us all pray for peace in our troubled world._


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Some time during the night, Rebekah was awakened by light. Staring out from her glass prison, she realized that someone was in the cellar with a flashlight, or what she called a torch. Curious, she watched as the light illuminated the outside of the doll house. What was going on? Were they being rescued? Her heart jumped at the prospect. But then she saw that it was Ron.

Finn woke also when the house seemed to shake slightly and a hinge grated. He lay still, listening. He didn't think the front or back walls were being opened, so what was it? Something outside was producing light that moved. Then he heard Ron's voice in a deep whisper. He was not speaking any language that Finn was familiar with. A small male voice answered him in the same language. The miniature vampire in the attic! Was there anyone else up there? After a couple of minutes of listening, Finn decided that there was only the one man.

He heard what sounded like a plate or cup fall and break. There was some hushed cursing by both men. It occurred to him that Ron was bringing food to the attic captive. Did Kendra know the man was there? Was it possible that only Ron knew? Otherwise, why was he sneaking down to the cellar late at night carrying some sort of portable light?

Rebekah could not hear any voices, but she had seen Ron open up the roof, shine the light inside and then talk to the little vampire in the attic. Like Finn, she concluded that Ron brought food and drink to the man hidden under the roof. How long had the fellow been there? How long did the spell last that Kendra had cast? Maybe Ron didn't rescue him because he would have a hard time surviving being that small, so where could Ron take him? It was likely that only Kendra could reverse the spell.

If by some chance the Mikaelsons found her and Finn, could they be taken from the doll house? How would they regain full size? Mother Esther probably had the power to undo the spell. The young witch Bonnie might also. But first, the captives had to be located.

Ron closed the roof and left the cellar. Finn got out of bed and went into the back bedroom. He went to the hole in the wall and asked in French, "Do you speak French?" He asked the same question in German and Greek. He knew his French, German and Greek were not the modern versions, but he thought the other vampire might speak one of those languages as well as his mother tongue.

To his surprise, he heard the soft tread of bare feet on the hidden stairs. In a moment the vampire said something in German which Finn did understand. With relief, he told the man his name was Kenneth Finley. He had almost said his real name, but had thought better of it.

The other vampire said his name was Linek and that he was from Poland. He had been a prisoner for a couple of months and had been shrunk down by accident when Kendra had started shrinking the house. Working in remodeling the house after-hours, he had been trapped. Terrified of the woman and what was happening, he hadn't known what to do. Luckily, Ron spoke Polish well, had seen Linek and had decided to hide him in the attic. It wasn't the best choice, but Linek had no real say in what was happening. So, there he was. Kendra didn't know he was there and Ron looked after him.

Finn decided that Linek was not Bill, the man whose name was on the ring Rebekah had found. The ring even could have belonged to someone in the house before it was made small. He asked Linek if any others had been shrunk down and put in the house. The Polish man said a woman had been there, but she had cried and screamed a lot and Kendra had finally taken her away. Also, some human woman came to the house to clean. Linek had heard her singing to herself and had asked Ron, who told him she was a maid and Kendra didn't allow her stay long. Linek admitted to Finn that he had hoped to have the woman for sex and blood.

Finn wondered what Kendra had done with the other captive, the one who had screamed a lot. If Kendra had known about Linek in the attic, she might have given the woman to him. Or not. Or she might have put the little man down in the rest of the house where he, Finn, and his sister were living. Actually, he didn't like the idea on Linek being in the house and maybe trying to get to Rebekah.

The two men ended their conversation, expecting that they would be able to continue at some time. Finn retreated to his bed and spent a long time thinking about the situation he and his sister were in as well as Linek's secret captivity.

Dawn apparently came because Kendra turned on the lights and entered the cellar. She went to the big jar where Rebekah sat glaring at her. The big woman unscrewed the jar lid and looked down at the tiny young woman.

"Are you going to behave yourself?" she asked.

Rebekah had a nasty reply in mind, but she held it back. If she wanted to get back into the doll house, she needed to appear chastened and obedient. "Yes, ma'am," she said in her little voice.

Kendra reached into the jar and lifted Rebekah up and out. She then carried her to the house, used her free hand to unlock and open the back wall and then set the little captive down in the yellow bedroom.

Rebekah knew the shield was down because she felt nothing as she was placed inside the house. There was no logic in dashing right back outside. Where would she go? Besides, she wanted to get back with Finn.

"I'll bring you breakfast soon," Kendra said and she moved away.

Rebekah did wave a hand out the open back of the room, but she felt the barrier. Kendra obviously had good control over it.

Finn came into the room and asked, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. Are you?" she asked as Finn came close and gave her a hug.

"Yes. You smell like vinegar."

"That big jar is a pickle jar and still smells of pickles. Finn, did you hear anything last night?"

"Yes. Ron came and fed the man in the attic. They both speak Polish. However, I did speak to the fellow in German after Ron left." He told his sister about the conversation he had had with Linek, while Rebekah washed her face and hands in the bathroom.

"Did he say why he was working on the house? I mean, is he a day-walking vampire?" she asked.

"I didn't ask and he didn't say. Well, he did say he worked after hours. I assume he meant after daylight. If he's not a day-walker, he must have been working at night and Kendra didn't realize he was there."

"Interesting," Rebekah said. "With all the work she had done, maybe she had a crew working nights. Klaus did that with his house."

In a couple of minutes, she opened the cabinet under the sink and looked at the water pipes again. "The man in the attic confirmed that Kendra miniaturized this whole house. That means there really are water pipes in the walls. Kendra had men disconnect the pipes and plaster the holes. The electric wiring is real, but it can't be carrying 110 volts."

"What are volts?"

"A measure of electricity. It isn't all the same. The wires are now tiny and the voltage would burn them up as well as burn this house to ashes."

"I don't understand all that, so I'll take your word for it."

"I don't understand most of it, either." She stood up and closed the cabinet doors. She headed out and down the stairs. Finn followed her, noting that the aroma of vinegar was still clinging to her.

"I know Kendra will bring us human food, but I really could use some blood," he said. "I had plenty that first day, but I need more."

"I know," his sister said. She recalled the scene now three days past. She and Kol had been revived by Elijah before he did the same for Finn. They had watched Elijah pull the dagger from Finn's chest and they had stood near their coffins waiting for Finn to waken. Elijah had brought a large plastic cooler full of bags of blood from a blood bank. All three had consumed some, but Kol had needed the most. He had complained about the cold blood with the odd taste, but it had revived his spirits and his energy.

When Finn had finally roused, he had found himself lying in an open coffin. He had a sore chest and long-dried blood on his shirt. He had had no trouble recognizing his siblings, although their clothing seemed odd to him. It was Elijah who had poured blood from the small bags into a glass for Finn, who hungrily consumed glass after glass. He hadn't liked its chill nor the flavor which Elijah said was heparin, added to prevent clotting, but it made him feel much better. Still, what he really craved was the hot blood from a living human body. Some time later, he had been allowed by Klaus to feed on one of the servants as long as he did not harm the person. That had taken a lot of self-control, but he had managed.

Now, he really wanted more fresh blood. He wanted Kendra to allow him to bite into one of her fingers. Would he be able to suck her normal blood up along his fangs or would he have to just lick it up? Tiny mosquitoes had no trouble sucking up human blood. Actually, he didn't care what he had to do as long as he got some, which disturbed him greatly. He didn't like being a vampire.

"What do you think our siblings and Mother are doing right now?" he asked his sister as they went into the kitchen to await breakfast.

"Pitching a royal fit, I would assume," Rebekah said. "I think Mother would cast a locator spell to find us, unless Kendra is blocking it somehow."

"I used to have so much interest in magic and spells," Finn admitted. "I felt powerful."

"And you didn't feel powerful when she made us into vampires?"

"Yes, but in a different way, of course."

"Sometimes I think I'd choose to be human again if I could," Rebekah admitted.

"You would?" Finn said, surprised, and he saw his sister nod.

"I know I would, too. I hate being a vampire, a beast! At least we aren't the abomination that Niklaus is. I mean, his being a hybrid and proud of it. He can be more cruel than Kol sometimes. I remember that and I've seen it's still there within him."

"He can get very angry and frustrated. I feel he is sometimes insecure and he hides it behind the cruel things he says or does."

"Father did that to him," Finn said, nodding. He was not fond of his middle brother, the half-brother, and he was sure that would never change. He just hoped Klaus would never lock him away in a coffin again. At least, daggered and "dead," he had not known he was in that confined place.

Loud voices and crying caught their attention and they went to the open back of the kitchen. Kendra and Ron were coming down the stairs and they had a woman with them. It was she who was crying and pleading.

"Please let me go! Please! Why are you doing this? I haven't done anything to you. Kidnapping me won't get you anything. My family doesn't have any money!"

"You're repeating yourself, dear," Kendra said. She had one of the woman's arms while Ron had the other. The woman resisted, trying to pull away, but she was not a fighter. If so, she would have been biting and kicking as well. Since she was not doing so, it made it easier for the husband and wife to handle her.

"What now?" Rebekah murmured to Finn. "That woman is human."

"They're putting her in the circle," he observed. "Will Kendra shrink her down and put her in here? The very idea is making me hungrier."

"Don't drool, brother," Rebekah whispered with a chuckle.

"I am disgusted by my reaction, but I am unable to resist," he admitted.

The two of them watched as the red-headed woman sat down on the floor in the middle of the circle because Kendra ordered her to do so. The human, who looked to be in her mid-twenties, sobbed and made no effort to get out of the markings on the floor, even when Kendra waved her hands and the candles were lit, even when the witch closed her eyes and chanted. Then she let out a cry of pain and collapsed, disappearing into a pile of clothing.

Kendra moved into the circle, felt around in the clothing and retrieved the tiny, naked body. She brought it to the house and laid it on the kitchen floor next to the water container.

"This is Melissa. Feed on her, if you want. Take her to bed, Kenneth. Have fun with her," Kendra said with a grin.

Melissa was stunned, but awake. She looked up at Finn and Rebekah and then at the big face of Kendra at the open back wall. Frightened by the giant, she screamed and scrambled on hands and knees under the kitchen table. Kendra laughed, reached into the house and nudged the table aside.

As the woman cowered, Finn struggled to control himself. He wanted to rush over to Melissa and sink his fangs into her neck. He also found himself responding to her nakedness in a more manly way. He had never been one to condone rape, but as a vampire, sometimes turned on sexually by feeding, he had committed it in the distant past, much to his self-contempt. It was another aspect of being a vampire he hated.

He watched as Rebekah went to the woman and offered words of encouragement. She got the woman on her feet and gave her a hug. With more control and less of an urge than Finn, she didn't bite the neck so close to her. But Finn was shocked by what his sister did. Rebekah had the woman look her in the eyes and proceeded to compel her to do something unexpected.

"You are not afraid of me or Kenneth over there. When you look at him, you realize that he is handsome and charming and you would like to be intimate with him. Look at him now and see how much you want him."

Melissa turned her head and looked at Finn. Her eyes roamed from his face and down the front of his caftan. Despite the looseness of the garment, his excitement still showed. Melissa smiled slightly. She tipped her head to the side and flirted with him.

Rebekah spoke again. "Go upstairs to one of the bedrooms and get in bed. He will come to you." She walked the nude woman to the door to the hall and to the stairs.

Finn stood in the kitchen, torn between what he should not do and what he really wanted to do. Obviously, Rebekah had understood his needs and compelled the woman to meet them. He was rather appalled, but he knew he could not pass up this opportunity. He walked out into the hall.

"She went into the room over the kitchen. Be reasonably kind to her," his sister said. "I would like some fresh sustenance too."

Finn looked up the stairs. "Thank you." He then went up to the landing and looked into the bedroom. Melissa was in bed, the covers pulled up to her waist and a welcoming smile on her face. She beckoned to him and he went toward her. She lifted the covers and, hiking up his caftan to his waist, he settled onto the bed and into her waiting arms. He completely ignored the large faces of Kendra and Ron peering into the bedroom and he proceeded with what was more important.

_A/N So, things in the doll house have changed, somewhat to Finn's advantage. Still, he and the other three are captives. _

_I hope everyone is having a good holiday season. I received the new "Originals" calendar as a Christmas gift. Nice pictures!_


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Rebekah returned to the kitchen. She, too, ignored the big humans right outside the house. She hoped the two people upstairs were covered up for some privacy. Her excellent hearing told her what was going on and she was pleased to hear a couple of giggles from Melissa as well as moans of pleasure. Controlling someone's mind, making them react in a manner contrary to how they would have if uncontrolled, was not a right and moral thing to do, but Rebekah had done it so many times in her life, she rarely gave it a thought. As far as she was concerned, it simplified things and also made them easier on the victim.

When all was quiet upstairs, she spoke up, "Kendra, how about some breakfast?"

The big woman's face appeared just outside the kitchen. "I think ole Kenneth is having his. Why aren't you having some nice fresh blood? I'd think you'd want some."

"Later. Midmorning snack, maybe," Rebekah said.

"I didn't expect you to compel her to want Kenneth," Kendra admitted. "That was very thoughtful of you."

"I knew he wanted her, but he was reluctant to give in to his desires. He did tell you he was in love with a specific woman. If he were not hungry, it would have been mean of you to put such temptation in front of him. And besides, I didn't want to listen to a lot of crying and screaming."

"Ha! Your real motive. Alright. I'll go make breakfast for all three of you. That is, if you can get them out of bed." The two big humans walked away from the doll house and went up the stairs.

Rebekah considered that it might be necessary to modify the way Melissa now felt about Finn. She could become too clingy, or even demanding. Finn might think that too much of a good thing was too much and become annoyed. If so, there was no reason why he could not compel her himself to be less clingy.

In just a few minutes, Finn came into the kitchen in his caftan. Melissa was with him, holding onto his arm possessively. She was now wearing a big bath towel wrapped around. It covered her from her upper chest to her knees. Rebekah thought both people looked rather pleased with themselves.

"Kendra is bringing breakfast. That is, if you two are still hungry." She could tell Finn had taken blood from the woman, both because of his sated expression and improved color and because Melissa had a couple of red marks on her neck. Finn had been neat about the feeding, leaving no blood on either himself or her. Rebekah also noted that they had not washed up after their romp in bed and the scent of sex clung to them as they took seats at the table.

"Kenneth says you two have been here since yesterday," Melissa said, frowning. "How are any of us to escape? We're so small, we could get stepped on."

"We don't know yet," Rebekah said. "Did you have a cell phone?"

"I did, but they took it away from me. What do you think they are going to do with us?"

"Don't know. Maybe Kendra just wanted little people for her doll house."

Melissa looked around and said, "This place looks so real!"

"It _is_ real," Finn told her. "Kendra actually shrunk down a real house! The only thing we don't have is water in the pipes."

"I'd be really amazed at this if I wasn't so scared. We could be stuck here _forever_! I have a husband and a baby boy. They _need_ me." Tear came to her eyes.

"Kenneth and I are sure we will be rescued," Rebekah said with a confident tone. She didn't want the young woman getting hysterical again.

"How? How can anyone find us? And what if that woman won't make us normal-sized again?"

"It will be alright," Finn said reassuringly.

Melissa reached out and took his hand. "I have you and I trust you, Kenneth. What am I going to tell Wade? He's my husband. I love him too."

"I am just a passing fancy," he told her. "You will forget me after we leave here. And I see no reason to tell your husband about our intimacy."

"Oh, I don't think I'd forget. No, I think you made love to me better than Wade does. Of course, I would never tell him that." Melissa's whispered.

Finn felt complimented. He hadn't lost his touch to please a woman.

"I won't say anything at all about sex if possible," she continued. She gave him a penetrating look. "You told me you were sterile. If that isn't true and I get pregnant, I don't know what I'll do."

"Your can say I raped you and you couldn't stop me. However, I truly am unable to father a child, Melissa. So if you find yourself with child, it will not be by me," he said firmly.

"All right. I believe you," the woman said.

Finn thought it would have been nice if the woman had been Sage. He remembered that Linek was up in the attic and had probably heard what was going on below him. When was the last time that man had had a woman? He had not said he had a wife who must be worried about him. Finn had no intention of offering Melissa to him. Besides, he couldn't get down from the attic.

To Rebekah he said, "Kendra took the table and the leg you broke. I assume she will make repairs."

"I'll try not to break anything else. I'd prefer not to spend another night in the pickle jar," Rebekah snorted.

"Is that why you smell like a pickle?" Melissa asked, wrinkling her nose.

Rebekah was annoyed by this, but she said nothing.

"We have to believe that our family is looking for us," Finn said.

"But will they find us down here?" Melissa wondered aloud. Changing the subject, she said, "I wish I could wash my hands before we eat."

Finn got up from his chair and went to where a second bucket sat near the water container. He dipped water out and went to the sink, saying, "Here you go. Come wash your hands."

When they had each washed their hands, they both returned to their seats. Rebekah saw her brother wince and press a hand to his abdomen.

"Gas pain?" she asked.

"Yes."

"You need to drink more water, Finn. I know you were drinking quite a bit of it when we were at Klaus' house, but you haven't been drinking hardly any since we came here."

"I know. My intestines should be working normally by now," he said with a frown.

Both he and Rebekah knew that his intestines had not worked for nine hundred years. They had not been damaged, but any digesting food in them had slowly dried into rocks. Re-hydrating and softening those lumps took time and a lot of new fluids. Rebekah and Kol, who had also been daggered by Klaus, but for shorter time periods, were familiar with the process. Elijah had never been daggered for any long period of time.

Rebekah stood up and walked to one of the cabinets. There were plates and glasses there and she removed one of the latter. Going to the big container, she dipped a glassful of water and brought it to her brother.

"Drink it down," she ordered and he did.

Melissa listened to the conversation, but didn't add anything to it. She and her two companions looked up when they saw Kendra coming down the stairs with a dinner plate. As before, she brought the plate to the open back of the house and moved an inch of it into the kitchen. Finn stood and went to retrieve the tiny plates, utensils and cups from the big plate. There was an urn of coffee, plus sugar and cream. Ham, bacon, scrambled eggs, toast and a couple of other things were on each plate. Salt and pepper were already on the table from the evening before.

Sitting down at his place, he eyed the mound of white stuff with a pat of butter melting in the middle. "What is this?"

"Grits," Melissa said. "You've never eaten grits?"

"I don't believe so."

"Yes, you have," Rebekah said. "It's ground corn cooked up like porridge. We had it as children when we lived here. The natives grew the corn and showed our people how to grind it. It's still very popular around here."

"Oh. Yes," Finn said, recalling those distant days at the beginning of his life. Hand-grinding the corn had been women's work.

The three people were hungry and ate the food with enthusiasm. Kendra watched for a few minutes and then left. She returned with a plastic tub that had been miniaturized.

"Put your dirty dishes in the tub when you're through. I see you aren't going to wash the dishes yourself," she said with some annoyance. Any dishes she had brought to the kitchen had remained on the table, on the counter by the sink or in the sink. As she had observed, neither Rebekah nor Finn had made any move to wash them.

"Rebekah, what is your brother's phone number?" she asked as she picked up a pen and a pad of paper from a table.

Rebekah didn't know which brother she meant.

"Are you going to ask for ransom?" she asked.

"Maybe. What is his number?"

Thinking this was a step in the direction of being rescued, the blonde Original gave Klaus' cell phone number. He was the most likely to deal with Kendra. He and the others could make a plan of some sort.

Kendra wrote down the number and then left the cellar to make the call. Rebekah, Finn and Melissa continued to sit at the table and discuss their hopes. No mention was made of the vampire in the attic.

Having made no progress during the night, the Mikaelson family members still at the mansion ate breakfast early and prepared to go out. They had cruised around the northern and western parts of town, but had not found any sign of Rebekah and Finn. This morning they all piled into Klaus' big SUV to search the southern and eastern reaches. Klaus drove with Elijah beside him. Their mother sat behind Klaus while a restless Kol sat behind Elijah.

Both Klaus and Elijah had tried to phone their sister again, but to no avail. They had to pin their hopes on Esther's ability to sense her children. If they drove near where the siblings were, the mother might feel something.

After half an hour of silence in the vehicle, Kol looked at his mother and said, "Nothing? At what distance do you think you can sense them?" He had voiced this question before in different words. "Should we open the windows more than just a crack?"

"I have explained that I can feel them at quite a distance, but I believe my efforts are being blocked by another witch. If we can get close enough, then maybe …"

Kol gave a huff of frustration and settled back in his seat. He was the one who usually got into trouble; how had Rebekah and Finn managed to do it?

While cruising along a back road, Klaus stopped the car and backed it up, stopping again at the entrance to a driveway. Trees and shrubs blocked the view, except at the driveway itself.

"What?" asked Elijah.

"I know I went to a house in there to talk to a man in the construction business," Klaus said. "It was after I purchased the mansion from that old couple." He had spent a small fortune remodeling and renovating the old mansion into the lovely place it now was.

"What is your point?" Elijah asked, not seeing anything down the driveway.

Klaus turned his vehicle into the dirt driveway and slowly drove forward. "My point is, the house is gone."

"It was torn down?" Kol asked. "So what?"

Klaus didn't answer him. Instead, he parked and got out of the SUV. His mother and brothers did too. Walking forward, they came to a wide hole in the ground. It wasn't deep, maybe eight feet with a large flat bottom.

"The house sat here. This is where the cellar was," Klaus said, feeling uneasy.

"There has been magic practiced here," Esther said softly, closing her eyes.

"What's that down there?" Kol asked, pointing to a small rectangular thing sitting in the middle of the empty space. Scrape marks in the surrounding dirt led to it. He jumped down to go see.

Klaus and Elijah followed, noting the many prints of boots in the dirt. They came to stand over the thing, staring at it. In fact, they squatted down to get a better look.

"Unless I am mistaken, that is the cellar and furnace of a house," Elijah observed. "A tiny house."

_A/N I hope you all liked this chapter. I know the story is moving sort of slowly. Will the family realized the missing persons now might be very small? Will Kendra really phone Klaus?_


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

"Yes," Klaus agreed. He stood up and looked at the scrape marks in the dirt. "It does appear that this cellar originally filled this hole and was actually shrunken down to this small size."

"Stone walls, cement floor, furnace and some pipes," Elijah agreed. "Mother, is it possible to shrink a whole house?"

"Yes. A witch with enough power and the proper spell can do it. It would take time, perhaps having to be done in steps," Esther said, looking down into the hole.

The brothers moved to the dirt side-wall and easily leaped upward to stand by their mother. They looked around and saw no evidence that large equipment had been brought to the location to demolish the house or to move it.

"They didn't put the house on wheels and take it away," Klaus said, looking at the surrounding area. Because of the many trees, there was no route to do that.

"Someone made the house very small and carried it away," Esther said, nodding to herself.

"Very interesting," Kol said, "but this has nothing to do with our sister and brother."

"I'm not so sure," Esther said, frowning with concentration.

"They were here?" Klaus asked, turning to stare at his mother.

"Were they shrunk down to wee people?" Kol asked, smiling and not believing it.

"I don't sense them here," Esther admitted. "However, there is something. Some connection. I just cannot figure it out."

Klaus' cell phone rang and he fished it out of his pocket. Seeing the caller I.D., he barked, "Rebekah! Where _are_ you?"

"Who is this?" a woman's voice came, and he knew it was not Rebekah's.

"Who are _you_?"

The call was ended by the woman. Klaus immediately phoned right back. No one answered. Rebekah's phone was now turned off.

The group looked at each other. Someone had the sister's phone. Who? Would they call again?

"We should find out who owns this property," Elijah said. "If it does have anything to do with our siblings, that might be a lead."

"And we'd be wasting time if it does not," Kol said.

"You have any better idea?" Klaus said, glaring at his kid brother.

"No."

"Perhaps Sheriff Forbes can find out what cell tower the call used," Elijah suggested. "It would help to pinpoint an area for us."

"If the call was made from Mystic Falls and we have only one cell tower here, it won't help much," Klaus growled. The group headed back to the vehicle. While they continued to cruise around, they did contact the sheriff and she said she would see what she could do. She called back in a few minutes and said that Mystic Falls was served by two cell towers, one to the north of town and one southeast. The phone call had been made within range of the one to the southeast. Already on the east side, Klaus took a road that went south.

With breakfast finished, the miniature trio sat at the kitchen table for some time talking. They wondered if Kendra would get through to Klaus and what sort of agreement they would reach. For one thing, what did Kendra really want? Was it little people for her doll house or was it something from Klaus? Initially, Kendra had been heard to say that Finn was not the right brother. What business did she have with any of the other three?

The brother and sister were careful what they said in front of Melissa. They really didn't want her to know they were siblings. And what about Linek? Had he learned by overhearing that Finn was a brother, too? Would he tell Ron? Did it really matter?

Eventually, Finn said he wanted to go to the study and look at more books. Melissa was inclined to go with him, but he told her to help clean up the kitchen. Because of Rebekah's hypnotic suggestion, she agreed to cheerfully do whatever he wanted of her. She piled the various dirty dishes and utensils in the bin Kendra had provided and used a couple of paper towels off a miniaturized roll to wipe the table and counter clean.

Rebekah left her to this chore and went upstairs. She wished she had something clean to put on, something that didn't smell like pickles. In the nursery she found a couple of safety pins in the corner of a drawer. Turning her back to the camera positioned high in the room , she removed her caftan, took the small blanket from the crib and found that it could be wrapped all the way around her, much as the bath towel did on Melissa. The two pins held it in place.

She went into the yellow bedroom and used the hair brush to neaten her long blonde hair. In a minute she stood looking at the hole she and Finn had made in the wall. The broken table leg was gone because Kendra had taken it and the table to fix them. Rebekah could speak a form of High German. Would Linek talk to her? She went to the hole.

"Linek, are you there?"

No one answered, but she could smell him. He was probably sitting on the stairs, listening to her and catching her scent. He probably could smell the aroma of breakfast, too. Was he hungry? He had talked to Finn without hostility, but what would be his attitude toward the two women? Rebekah knew from experience that some men thought women were good for only one thing. She also knew it was not fair to assume she could not trust men she didn't know, but, fair or not, it was what she felt.

She didn't put her hand through the hole. If Linek was close, he could grab it. Instead, she left the bedroom and went into the bathroom to use the toilet. There was just enough water left in the bucket to send the waste down the drain to the collection tank under the house. As far as she could tell, the camera up by the ceiling was still smeared with dried soap. The image from it would be poor.

Melissa went into the study to join Finn. She felt drawn to him because of what Rebekah had told her. She came up behind him as he sat looking at pictures of modern Norway. Her hand slipped down inside his caftan and she gently rubbed his chest, playing with his chest hairs. She let her lips touch one of his ears.

Finn again was torn between liking what she was doing and feeling he was cheating on Sage. Although he had said nothing about it to Melissa, he had envisioned Sage being under him as they were together in the bed upstairs. By keeping his eyes closed or by not looking into the young woman's face, he could pretend she was Sage. He was a bit ashamed of doing that, but not much. _Where is Sage now?_ he wondered. _Is she really still alive?_

"Please find something else to do, Melissa. I would like to read for a while." He tried not to sound dismissive. Besides, he wasn't ready to lay her down on the couch and pull up her towel.

"Alright," the woman said with a sigh. In a minute, she was seated at the piano and playing a tune. The piano had an odd sound, but she played several songs.

For some reason one of the songs reminded him of his brother Kol. It had not been unusual for the young brother to sing with enthusiasm when he heard a song and knew its words. When he and Rebekah had been sitting on the ledge above the river, one of the things they had spoken about was Kol's behavior.

"What do you think about Kol?" he had asked her.

"Kol is as he has always been, I suppose. He's been in a coffin off and on for centuries, according to Nik's whims. He was daggered again in 1914 and my guess is that he hasn't changed. He's sly, manipulative, charming, clever, amusing and dangerous. He can be smiling at you and at the same time be planning something awful. I know Nik can do the same, but it's different. Do not ever trust Kol, Finn."

"He was such a good and humorous little boy."

"Well, he hasn't been that in a very long time," she had said as she looked down at the river.

In the house, Rebekah came down the stairs and into the study. She listened to the piano for a moment. "That instrument is pathetic. It wasn't meant to be miniaturized."

"I agree," Finn said, putting the book on an ottoman. He looked up at the ceiling when he heard a strange roar coming from upstairs.

"What is that loud noise?"

Rebekah listened as the sound came and went, becoming distant. "It's a jet."

"A what?"

"A jet airplane. Somewhat like a car, only it flies."

"Elijah explained about the thin white streaks in the sky. I thought they were odd clouds. He tried to explain about these airplanes, but I can't imagine them."

"You've been looking at pictures, many of them taken from up in the sky, haven't you?"

"Yes. I thought perhaps from a mountain. From an airplane?"

"Yes. I think I saw a book about World War II. It would have pictures of planes." She went to one of the bookcases and found the book. Opening it, she saw that it was mostly text, but there were sections with black-and-white photographs of ships, tanks and war planes from that era.

"These are planes from about seventy years ago, I think," she said to her brother, putting the book in his hands. "You can tell the size of the plane if it's on the ground with men standing by it. And that picture is of a plane in the air. It's much bigger and there are several men inside. Planes are even bigger now. They can carry two or three hundred people."

Finn studied the various pictures. "What was the point of having these planes during a war?"

"They had guns to shoot down other planes or they dropped bombs on towns and cities. Very destructive."

In Finn's earlier days of marching armies, horses and wagons, swords, and bows and arrows, destruction of towns was usually by causing raging fires or managing to make holes in defensive stone walls. Now, he came to a picture that showed bombs falling out of the underside of an airplane. Another picture showed part of a city in flames. He recalled stories of the Chinese having burning and exploding powder a long time ago. Apparently, it had become quite a weapon over the centuries.

He shook his head, partly from wonder and partly from sadness. "The world is so different now. All these inventions. Is it better or worse?"

"Some of both," Rebekah admitted.

Melissa gave up playing the piano and joined the siblings. She calmly adjusted her towel wrap, since it was slipping and gaping open, revealing her lower torso. "I have a really nice piano," she told them. "A baby grand." After a silent pause, she added, "Will I ever get to play it again?"

"I'm sure you will," Rebekah said. She really didn't think this imprisonment and miniaturization was going to last. Her family would rescue them soon. She certainly hoped so, because she was bored with the doll house.

_Perhaps I would not be so bored if I were not a captive. After all, I'm not confined to a cell. I need to be doing something and I don't feel like reading a book. I guess I could try the television and see if there's any reception. I seriously doubt there is any mention of Finn and me being missing. I wish I knew what the family is doing to find us._

Sheriff Forbes had made some progress which she reported to Klaus. She had found out that The K Diatom Corporation had bought the property on which the missing house had been standing. She had not found out anything about the corporation except that they had paid the full price with a check from a bank in Charlottesville.

"Why would a corporation buy a house like that?" Klaus asked his family as he continued to drive along roads and country lanes. "Unless, of course, a witch associated with the business planned to miniaturize the place."

"The corporation might just be a front so that the person's real name is not on the deed," Elijah said.

"So, this was not a 'spur of the moment' decision. Someone took the time to plan this out," Klaus agreed.

"I can't seem to connect with Rebekah or Finn," Esther said from the back seat of the car, "but I just feel that they are not far away."

"Your locator spell already told us that, Mother," Kol reminded her impatiently. He didn't say so, but he was hungry for blood and wanted to go find someone to feed on. And perhaps do something more than feed. He had already seduced one of the mansion's maids, but he liked variety. He was a restless young man on the prowl – if he could just get away from his family for a while.

"I wish Finn had a phone," Klaus said. "Not that it would make a difference. He doesn't want one and didn't want to learn how to use it."

"We have to be patient with him," Elijah said. "He's a man of the distant past and the adjustment is overwhelming."

"And he's one to like the old ways," Kol said with a snort. "He was always resistant to change."

"Unlike you," Klaus said, returning the snort.

"I welcome change! Love it," Kol exclaimed, raising his arms with enthusiasm. "Look at that!" He was looking out the side window and up toward the sky.

Overhead, a military jet roared by, heading east.

Esther cringed at the deafening sound and a fear that the machine would fall out of the sky. Like Finn, she had been more comfortable with the distant past. Unlike Finn, she had been able to monitor her children over the centuries, often hating what they were doing. Along the way, even from her coffin, she had absorbed some of the worldly changes that had occurred. But it was now stressful to actually have to deal with these radical changes.

"Let us return to the house," she said. "This riding around and finding nothing helpful is making me hungry. It must be time for a midday repast."

"I'm all for that!" Kol agreed.

Discouraged by their failure to locate the missing people, Klaus turned at the next intersection and headed for the mansion.

The boredom at the doll house was interrupted by Kendra bringing food for lunch. She removed the bin of dirty dishes and set it aside. As before, she placed the dinner plate at the edge of the kitchen so that her little people could take the tiny dishes and things from it. This time the main part of the meal was chicken salad on a bed of lettuce. The beverage was iced tea.

As the three captives sat down at the table to eat, Kendra remained, watching them.

"You gave me a phone number," she said to Rebekah. "Your phone listing doesn't say who the numbers are for. No names."

"The number I told you was that of my brother Niklaus," Rebekah said, speaking with food in her mouth.

"You have another brother. One named Elijah," the big woman said, her breath blowing the napkin off Rebekah's lap.

The siblings stopped eating and looked at each other and then at Kendra.

"You want Elijah's number? Why?" Rebekah asked.

"I wish to speak to him." There was a hardness in the big woman's tone of voice.

_A/N So, it is Elijah the woman wants to make contact with. Why? I'll get to that eventually. I know this is a slow-moving story, so be patient, please. Thank you to those of you who have been reading it._


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

The three little people sitting at the kitchen table just stared at Kendra.

"What is his number?" the big woman repeated, determined to get Elijah's phone number.

Rebekah hesitated a moment before answering. So, it was Elijah who was the "right" brother. Was all this business because of something Elijah had done? It was possible. Although the dark-haired brother was usually calm, logical and debonair, he could be violent. On rare occasions, he could be savage and deadly.

"I'm sure he is with Nik. Call Nik again and ask to speak with Elijah."

"You are assuming they are together, but they may not be. You know they are searching for you and Kenneth."

"I certainly hope so," Rebekah said. She leaned down and retrieved her napkin from the floor. "What did Elijah do that makes you so determined to speak with him?"

"It's a private matter," Kendra said. "Which of these numbers on speed dial is his?"

"He doesn't like cell phones and rarely bothers to answer a call," Rebekah lied. "Your best bet is to call Nik again."

Kendra reached into the room and grabbed Finn, lifted him up from his chair, bumping his head against the kitchen ceiling. She took him out of the house and then ripped the caftan off his body. She set him back down on the kitchen floor. Stunned by the new bump on the head, he lay there for a long moment while the three women looked at his nude body.

Melissa jumped up from her chair and ran to kneel beside him. She looked up at Kendra and swore at her. Kendra reached into the room again and pressed a finger down on Finn's left leg. The three of them heard the crack of the shin bone, while the stunned Finn cried out in pain.

Melissa burst into tears because she knew this was her fault for swearing at the woman. Rebekah moved to her brother and said nothing. Mentally swearing in fury, she knelt by his legs.

"Tell me the phone number or I'll break his other leg," Kendra said. "Or maybe I'll get some scissors and snip a part of him right off."

Fearing for Finn's safety, Rebekah gave in and told her the number.

"This better be the right one this time."

"He may not answer," Rebekah grumbled.

"You better hope he does," Kendra said and she moved away, picking up the bin of dirty dishes as she headed for the stairs.

"Did you hear what she said?" Melissa hissed.

"Yes."

"What a horrible bitch!"

"Grab him by his arm pits. I'm going to pull on his leg and align the broken bone," Rebekah said. "Finn … Kenneth … This is going to hurt." However, he didn't seem completely aware. When the other woman had a grip on him, the sister grabbed his ankle and pulled firmly, causing him to cry out. She felt the bones line up and grab onto each other. They would be healed in a minute or so.

The pain of the fracture reduction stimulated Finn enough to wake him fully. He groaned, but lay still when Rebekah told him to do so. Again, she almost called him Finn rather than Kenneth. Maybe it didn't make any difference now that they knew it was Elijah Kendra was after. On the other hand, knowing she had two of the Mikaelsons might give the woman more leverage.

Finn assessed his situation, which was more pain. He hoped this captivity was not going to be one injury after another. His head hurt and he had a lump on his scalp. His leg ached and he recognized the feeling of healing bone. And he noticed that he was lying there nude. He recalled that Kendra had reached into the kitchen and lifted him from his chair at the table. After that, he didn't remember anything until waking fully.

"I seem to be in a state of undress," he mentioned, raising is head with a groan and looking down the length of his body.

"She took your caftan," Melissa said, wiping tears from her face. "Are you alright now?"

"I suppose so," he sighed, wincing. "How about a towel or something to cover me."

Melissa stood up and went to the sink. On a towel rack were two towels, one supposedly for drying dishes and the other a hand towel. She brought the latter and laid it across Finn's hips.

"You are such a prude, you know," Rebekah said with a chuckle.

"Well, I guess that's the way I am," he said. "Help me sit up." He was dizzy when the two women hauled him into a sitting position and a wave of nausea came to him. He swallowed a couple of times to fight the urge to vomit and it passed.

"I gave her Elijah's number," Rebekah admitted. "She threatened to do you more harm."

"Elijah will handle whatever Kendra wants."

"How many brothers do you have?" Melissa asked Rebekah.

"Four, all older than I." She didn't say more about them. Instead, she held onto Finn as he managed to stand up, one hand holding the towel in place. He was able to put weight on the healing leg. She and Melissa sat him on his chair at the table, the towel on his lap. His meal was only half eaten, but at the moment he had no appetite.

"I was very pleased the other day to wake up and join the others," he said, pressing his hands to his throbbing temples. "Now I'm not so sure about it."

At the mansion, the family finished the midday meal that had been prepared for them. Except for Kol, their appetites were slight and they didn't eat much. They spent a lot of time talking over what was going on and what might be happening to the two absent siblings.

Then Elijah's cell phone rang. He stood up and withdrew it from a pocket. Even though the call could be from anyone, they all stopped to see who it was. Elijah, looking at the caller ID, raised a hand so that no one spoke.

"Hello," he said, not really expecting Rebekah to be the one to speak.

"Is this Elijah?" the woman asked. She didn't use his last name, which did not surprise him. Like Klaus, he was known to several thousand (mostly vampires) simply as the Original vampire Elijah.

"Speaking. May I ask who this is?" he said calmly. While he held the phone to his cheek, he slid his left hand into his pants pocket, a common habit for him.

"You don't know me, but I know you. I have your sister, so I expect some cooperation on your part."

"You have Rebekah? What of the gentleman she was with?" Was Finn not with her? Did the woman not know he was Rebekah's brother?

"Him, too. I got these two vampires. If you want them back, then you will have to deal with me."

"Have you injured them?"

"Oh, him a little. He heals."

"Are you the witch who shrunk the house?"

There was a pause, which made Elijah smile slightly. He had surprised her.

"I don't know what you mean," the woman finally said, but he didn't believe her.

"I think you do, madam. What does that have to do with me or with my sister?"

"Nothing really. You must meet with me alone. By yourself if you want to find out what this is about."

"Let me speak to my sister."

"Can't do that."

"Then maybe you have already killed her."

"I'm not a fool, Elijah. I know she's an Original and can't be easily killed. I will call you back."

Elijah stared at his phone as the call suddenly ended. He tried calling Rebekah's phone, but again it was already turned off.

"What did she say?" Esther asked. The other two brothers said nothing because with acute hearing, they had listened to the conversation.

Elijah briefly told his mother.

"Oh dear. Poor Finn. It sound as if he has been tortured," the mother said. "I thought I felt some vague distress coming from somewhere, but with you three as tense as you are, it blocks any subtle signal I might get from those two."

"You should have said something! Perhaps we were near them," Klaus stated, annoyed.

"We'll just have to wait for another call," Elijah said, putting his phone away.

"Why did she stop talking?" Esther asked.

"So the call couldn't be traced," Klaus explained. "If a person stays on the line long enough, people with the right equipment can tell where the caller is."

"I see. Well, no, I don't, but I'll take your word for it."

"I'm going to go watch that television thing," Kol said, getting up from the table and giving a loud belch. He had eaten quite a bit and was pleasantly full.

Klaus' phone rang and he answered it. Sheriff Forbes told him a second call had been made from Rebekah's phone from the southeast area, from a small business parking lot. She also said there were surveillance cameras and she was going to check them out. Klaus thanked her for the information.

After telling his mother what the sheriff had to say, he asked Elijah, "Are you sure you have no idea who this woman is or what she wants?"

"I have absolutely no idea. I have enemies, just as you do," the older brother said.

"So it could be anyone from anywhere in the world, except the woman had an American accent," Klaus commented.

"The woman with whom I just spoke was certainly American," Elijah agreed.

Rebekah and Finn had to assume that Kendra had gone to phone Elijah. They and Melissa sat at the table long enough for the women to finish eating. Finn drank his tea and waited for his various pains to subside.

"Melissa, dear, would you see if there is another big towel upstairs that would go around me?" he asked finally. "I prefer not to walk around nude, clutching a small towel in front of my groin."

The young woman left the table and in a couple of minutes returned with a big bath towel with roses on it. One of Rebekah's, he noted. His sister said nothing about it as he stood up and Melissa wrapped it around him and tucked in the ends so that it stayed in place.

"Aren't we just the latest in fashion models?" Rebekah said sarcastically.

"Better than buck naked," Melissa said, eyeing the baby blanket the sister was wearing. Were they doomed to wear this attire until they were rescued? Would they ever be rescued? Would she never see her husband and children again? The thought threatened to bring tears to her eyes.

While the two siblings left the kitchen, Melissa stayed to clean up after the meal. Still hungry, she finished off Finn's salad. She was worried about her family and hoped her husband was taking care of things. He had to be terribly worried. Surely he had gone to Sheriff Forbes about her disappearance. Would anyone connect her disappearance with that of Rebekah and Finn? As far as she could guess, the only reason she had been taken was so she could provide blood for the two vampires and share Finn's bed. As yet, Rebekah had not bitten her. That could change at any time.

She had heard some time ago the rumors that there were real vampires in Mystic Falls, but she hadn't really believed it. Yes, she knew some people had died, apparently bitten by a mad dog, a cougar or some other wild animal, or so the official report had been. Now she knew there definitely were vampires around, two of them sharing a doll house with her. Finn had taken blood, but he had been careful not to really harm her. She could only hope that Rebekah would do likewise when the time came that she desired blood. Just how much blood could a human give before her life was in danger?

_A/N I hope you all found this chapter interesting. A little more action here. Things are a little hard for Finn and they are going to get _harder._ This is a pun with reference to the next chapter._


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

A/_N Warning: this chapter contains a form of sexual abuse._

Finished in the kitchen, Melissa roamed around the house. Except for Finn, who was engrossed in the books, the residents of the house were bored. Supposedly, even Linek up in the attic was bored or asleep. There was no sound coming from the upstairs of the regular-sized house, no footsteps, no running water, no creaking floorboards, no voices or music from a radio or television.

Then they heard footsteps coming to the stairs to the cellar. They were too heavy to be Kendra's. Curious, each captive moved toward a back room to see who it was. The back wall of the house was still open and Finn, Rebekah and Melissa ended up in the kitchen.

They were surprised to see that the visitor was neither Kendra nor Ron. It was one of the tall, young men that Finn called giants and Rebekah knew were basketball players. He came to squat down so he could look into the doll house. He found the three miniature people staring at him.

"What you wearing, mini people?" he asked with a laugh. "The last time I saw you, there were only two of you and you were naked. Now, there are three of you and you look like you just stepped out of the shower and wrapped towels around yourselves." He suddenly reached into the kitchen and grasped Finn. Without hitting the little vampire's head, he lifted him from the doll house.

"You are the cutest little thing, my man," he commented with a chuckle.

Finn was alarmed, but he didn't show it. He still thought of these big men as African giants. He feared being crushed in the huge fist and he recognized this one as the man who had had a sexual interest in him just before Kendra miniaturized him and his sister.

"Put me down!" Then he realized that shouting in his little voice wasn't going to work. It totally lacked authority.

"You remember me? I felt you up before Kendra made me stop," the big man said with a grin.

"Clive, isn't it?" Finn said evenly, trying to control his anger and fear.

"That's right. Man, I love that little voice. I love what you got down here, too," Clive said, lifting the rose towel and touching his captive's private parts. "So tiny, but perfect."

Finn cringed, expecting the huge finger to bruise him, but instead the touch was very light and gentle. It caressed him. The last thing he wanted was to react to the touch in the way Clive wanted.

"I'd prefer that you didn't do that, Clive," he managed to say firmly.

"You don't like it?"

"I don't like a _man _to do that to me."

"Uh huh. I'm not going to hurt you, little man. Just want to see what you got when you're turned on."

Finn swore at him and bent his legs, hoping to force the finger away. Clive did move his finger away, but he then turned Finn over and caressed his bare bottom.

"What a cute little ass," Clive said, laughing. He put a quick little kiss on the pale flesh, much like a person might kiss a puppy on the head. Finn reached back and punched him in the nose, which made Clive laugh harder.

He turned Finn back over and got a finger between his legs. Now, it didn't matter if Finn bent his legs or not. The caressing started again, this time with the big thumb. He hoped his anger and fear would prevent any reaction, but Clive was patient. Gentle and patient. Despite Finn's determination, the flesh of his private parts was sensitive and finally responded.

"There we go!" Clive said with a grin. "Look what we got. Not bad, my man! Tiny, but plenty fine. I wish you were normal-sized or I was little for a while, long enough for us to have some fun. Oh, oh. Sounds like Kendra's home again." He put Finn down on his back on the kitchen floor where the two women still stood watching.

Embarrassed and relieved, Finn pulled down the towel to decently cover himself. He was also relieved that the reaction was subsiding.

"Did he hurt you?" Melissa asked.

"No. But damn it, how _dare _he do that!" Finn growled as he stood up.

"He could have hurt you but he didn't," Rebekah said.

"That's not the point! He had no right to handle me like that!"

"Let it go," Rebekah urged calmly. "If we get rescued soon, he won't get his hands on you again."

"Let it go? Surely you jest! Would you just shrug it off if someone had touched you that way?" Finn snapped irately.

"No. I would be angry and humiliated. I would plan revenge for later. We're too small to do anything right now," the sister explained in a hushed voice, since Clive was nearby.

Finn grumbled, but he had to agree.

Still, he was most annoyed and he shrugged off Melissa when she put a hand on his arm.

Kendra came down the stairs and saw Clive sitting on the couch near the doll house.

"What are you doing here?" she asked.

"I came looking for Ron, but he ain't home."

"How did you get in the house?" she asked, frowning.

"The front door wasn't locked. You shouldn't leave your house unlocked, Kendra."

She didn't press the point further. Instead, she looked at the three little people standing in the kitchen, watching.

"Are you going to make some more tiny ones?" Clive asked.

"I might. Rebekah, I spoke with Elijah."

"What did he say? What do you want from him?"

"It's none of your business."

"It is! I'm a prisoner because of whatever it is! Is he coming for us?"

"Not yet."

"Why not? Did you two not come to some agreement?"

"No. I'll make another call soon. Someone is probably tracing your phone, so I have to make the calls short. Come along, Clive," Kendra said and Clive stood up from his seat. He and Finn eyed each other. Clive grinned and Finn scowled.

When the two giants had headed for the stairs, Melissa said, " You could have told her what Clive did."

"I considered it," Finn admitted. "There could have been repercussions if Clive snuck back into the house. I don't want him to be my enemy."

"And you don't want him to be your lover, either," Rebekah said with a smirk.

"You think this is funny?" he growled.

"No. Not really." She decided not to joke about the assault on her brother. It was no laughing matter. Seeing the door at the head of the stairs close, she said, "Listen to me. The barrier may be down! I want to test it."

"Why do you think that?" Finn asked, still upset about what Clive had done. It seemed as if he could still feel the finger and thumb rubbing his private parts.

"Clive lifted you right out of here. Did you feel the barrier?"

"No, I didn't." He watched Rebekah move to the open back of the kitchen and reach out. She did not snatch her hand back.

"It's not turned on!" the sister said.

"Do you want to attempt an escape?" Finn asked. "We didn't do well the first time."

"How would we get down to the floor?" Melissa asked, looking down. It seemed a long way.

"There's an electric cord we can get to if we go out the front door," Rebekah told her. "I climbed up it to get into the house."

"I'm not sure …" Melissa said worriedly.

"We all have to go together. Otherwise the one that is caught will be tortured until the other two give up," Finn told her.

"Oh, my God," the woman murmured fearfully.

"We either go now or we stay and hope Elijah rescues us," Rebekah said urgently.

"We go," Finn said and Melissa nodded after a moment's hesitation.

The three of them ran to the front hall and opened the front door. They had no idea if anyone was monitoring the cameras, watching them. Rebekah led them around the corner of the house to where the electric cord went into the house at the bottom of the wall. She went down first, followed by Finn and then Melissa, who slipped, but was caught by Finn. His towel fell down around his feet and he grasped it, but didn't take time to wrapped it around his body.

Instead, the three little people ran for the wall next to the stairs. One of the boxes that had been moved was sitting there and they went behind it. They weren't sure where to go next until they saw a crack where the stair support met the wall. Rebekah found that she could squeeze through to the dark space under the stairs.

"Come on, Melissa," she urged.

"Are there spiders? If I see spiders I'll scream!"

"No spiders," the blonde vampire lied. She did see strands of web, but that didn't mean there was a live spider close by.

Melissa squeezed through the crack and had to adjust her towel when she got inside the space. Finally Finn made the attempt. It was tight for him. He passed his towel in to his sister and then wiggled and squirmed, scraping the skin on his back and chest. In a minute he was with his two companions and rewrapped his body.

"Well, here we are with little chance of getting out of here and now we have nothing but dirt and cobwebs," Finn said, his eyes roving around the dim space.

Finding herself standing barefooted and ankle deep in dirt and dust, Melissa grimaced and said, "This is so gross!"

"But we are free of the house and the barrier. And the cameras," Rebekah said. She peeked out a small crack and looked up at the doll house. "Damn!"

"What?" Finn asked, alarmed.

"Linek! He's at one of the dormer windows. He saw us come in here!"

"I wonder if he will keep the secret," the brother murmured. He looked up through a space in the step above him. "The door isn't closed tightly!"

His companions looked up also. "Kendra is getting very careless. First she left the barrier down and now the door is cracked open."

"Clive went through after Kendra. It's he who didn't shut the door tightly," Finn observed. "We need to get up there."

"I agree. The crack on the other side of the stairs is bigger," Rebekah said. "We can get through and out of here easier than we got in."

That's good," Finn said, touching his abraded skin. It was sore, but healing.

"Spider!" Melissa shrieked as one appeared in the very space they hoped to exit by.

_A/N This chapter had more action in it, so I hope you all liked it better._


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

All three little people stepped back and stared at the arachnid blocking their way.

"I don't think that's a type dangerous to people," Rebekah said, "but in this case we the people are really small."

Huge as it seemed, the creature stood no higher than Finn's ankles. That made it seem bigger than any spider any of them had ever seen. It stared at them with its multiple eyes.

"Spiders have _fangs_!" Melissa whimpered. "They all do."

"We know that," Rebekah said, frowning at the woman. Because of the size difference, the spider had fangs that actually were longer than the fangs of the tiny vampires.

While Melissa sobbed and trembled in terror, Finn and Rebekah looked around for a weapon. In the dust there were splinters of wood and several metal nails. Rebekah picked up one of the large splinters and Finn hefted up what would have been a three-inch nail, but was three feet long to him. Having been trained to fight with a sword during his human days, he set to work forcing the spider back out the crack.

Rebekah also pointed her wooden "sword" at the creature which waved its front legs at her and Finn.

"Don't let it get you!" Melissa cried. "It'll wind you up in its web."

"It's too small for that," Finn said, annoyed with her behavior, and he jabbed the nail at the spider. It turned and disappeared outside the crack. Knowing it could be just outside, Finn poked his head out. He didn't see it immediately, but then he turned his head and looked upward. Startled, he found it was on the wood just above his head. Quickly, he moved out through the crack and turned to face the creature. He waved his "sword" and the spider waved its front legs and the other two appendages near its mouth. The animal backed up on the wood of the stair enclosure.

"It's still here, but it's gone higher up," he said.

"I can't come out there with it right above us," Melissa moaned.

"It won't really attack us," Rebekah snapped. "I know it's big for a spider, but we are bigger. A lot bigger. Think of it as a Chihuahua barking, but not really attacking."

"I love dogs, but there's no way I can see that beast as a dog."

"If you can't go out with us, then stay here. I don't care," Rebekah said with disgust. She slid out of the crack, followed by a whimpering Melissa who ran to stand behind Finn. The three of them stood for a moment eyeing the lurking arachnid.

A noise caught their attention. It was some sort of banging sound and it was coming from the doll house. They stared at the house, but couldn't see up into the yellow bedroom far enough to see the hole Finn had made.

"I think Linek is trying to get out. He must be making a hole in the wall," Finn said. "Come along. We need to get up the stairs before anyone comes back."

They then had to run to the lowest step where they would start their ascent. They guessed the rise on the steps were seven or eight inches for a normal human, but that was seven or eight feet for the miniature trio. Finn gave Rebekah a boost and handed up his weapon. He was reluctant to abandon it. Then he lifted Melissa. The sister easily aided him in climbing up.

"It certainly would be easier if we could just jump," Rebekah said. "It's annoying not to have all of our vampire's special abilities. I guess we are lucky to have the fast-healing one."

"I wonder if that is because of some specific part of the spell Kendra did," Finn said, boosting his sister up the next step.

"It must be," she agreed, then helped haul Melissa up.

There were ten steps, so the climb took time and energy. Before they reached the top, they saw Linek run across the floor to the bottom step. It was the first time they had actually seen him. His hair was dark brown and he had a beard of several inches. He was very slender. He had on jeans, a plaid shirt and work boots, his clothing having been miniaturized as the house was made smaller.

"Wait for me!" he said in German.

"We can't," Finn answered. "We have to reach the top and go hide before Kendra comes back." The truth was that he didn't really know the man and therefore could not trust him. As far as Finn was concerned, he was guarding two young women.

In another minute, the trio reached the ninth step. As Finn boosted his sister up to the edge of the top one, she said, "Oops! Wait a sec. Our friend the spider is right here!" Melissa cringed and moaned fearfully beside Finn as he lowered his sister.

"Give me a boost and hand up the nail. I'll see if I can scare it off to the side again," he said.

Rebekah had the strength to easily lift her brother and she then handed him his weapon. He found the spider on the side edge of the step watching him. He suspected that it was merely curious. Did spiders feel curiosity? When he moved toward it, stamping his feet and waving the nail, the creature turned and disappeared over the side.

"All right. Come on up," he said, setting down the weapon and reaching down to grasp the raised hand of Melissa.

Once she was up, she cowered beside him and kept a fearful eye on the edge. She saw a spider leg come up to the top. "It's coming back!" she cried.

Finn glanced at it and saw the spider's head peek over the edge. It stayed there, watching. Finn grabbed onto his sister's upraised hand and lifted her to the step.

The three of them moved to the crack where the door was ajar. They listened, but didn't hear any voices or footsteps, no radio or television. The door led into a hall and at the far end was the front door. They ran in that direction, although they knew they couldn't open that door.

Elijah, suspecting that the woman would drive to the same strip mall as before, drove his car there and parked in front of a coin laundry. Although he had no one with him in the car, he knew Klaus, Kol and Esther were in another car not far away, watching. Now he just had to wait.

He had talked to Sheriff Forbes who had come to the small shopping center to see about any video cameras. They had decided that she would not be driving her law enforcement vehicle because if the kidnapper saw it, any meeting might be called off. So, he felt that Liz Forbes was nearby looking at video tapes.

He wasn't interested in having the kidnapper arrested on the spot. It was more important that he follower her back to wherever she was holding the siblings. That might not be a problem if the woman wanted to take Elijah prisoner, too. If he was taken, Klaus would be able to follow. Elijah was carrying two tracking devices. One was the GPS on his cell phone, while the other was in his leather belt. That one he had obtained from the sheriff.

His phone rang and he hoped it was the kidnapper, but it was Liz. She told him that the videos showed a white Cadillac sedan of interest. The female driver had parked, sat there using a cell phone and then had driven away. The license plate was not visible on the tape.

Moments after Liz's call, Elijah's phone rang again. Caller ID indicated that it was Rebekah's phone again.

"Yes?" he said.

"Where are you right now?" the woman asked.

"I'm sitting in my car waiting for your call. I am assuming you will want me to drive somewhere to meet you."

"And where is Klaus?"

"At the moment, I have no idea. He has been driving around looking, but that is rather a waste of time."

"It certainly is, unless he knows what he's looking for."

"He has no clue, I'm sure. What do you want me to do?"

He was given an address just two blocks from where he was parked. The woman had not returned to this same strip mall. She might not even be in the white car, he thought. Knowing that Klaus was watching him, he drove from the parking lot and headed down the road.

The phone rang again and he was told to park his car by the fast food place and walk to the nearby store with the sign that said _Insurance _and wait outside_. _In a couple of minutes, he was standing in front of the door to the place.

The phone rang again. "Go inside the insurance place and walk out the back door."

Elijah turned to the business door and found it unlocked, which was no surprise, but he was somewhat surprised to find no one inside. Walking to the back, he found the rear entrance unlocked and walked out to the back alley. A white Cadillac sat there with a woman at the wheel.

She lowered the window. "Drop your cell phone on the ground."

He did as he was told, knowing that there was still the tracking device in his belt.

She then told him to get in beside her. Elijah thought that she was taking quite a chance, knowing that he could kidnap her in turn or grab her and hurt her until she told where the captives were. But he decided to play along by her rules in hopes that she would take him to Rebekah and Finn. He opened the passenger door and got in.

"Put on your seat belt. I don't want to be stopped because you aren't wearing it," the woman said, driving down the alley.

"I don't believe I know you," Elijah said, buckling the belt. He could tell she was a human, but he couldn't tell if she was the witch they sought.

"I'm sure you don't." She didn't volunteer her name. "Don't think about taking me hostage and making a trade offer. If you do, the vampire friend of your sister will be killed."

Elijah thought that her statement confirmed that she didn't know that Finn was one of the Originals. He kept quiet as she drove along the short alley and out onto a side street. She made a couple more turns and he was sure she was heading out of town, although she had to stop at a red light at the intersection of the street and the main highway.

"I would appreciate your telling me what your interest in me is," he said calmly.

"You have no idea?"

"None at all," Elijah said as the light changed and she drove forward. His eyes shifted to the outside mirror to see if he could spot Klaus' vehicle, but the mirror angle was wrong.

Glancing at him, she said, "Well, I'll tell you …"

BANG! CRASH!

_A/N Oh, oh. It appears there is a glitch in the plan. This isn't what I intended to write, but it suddenly seemed like a good idea. I hope you all like this chapter._


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

The driver of a huge truck failed to stop for his red light and plowed right into the white Cadillac, crushing in the driver's side and sending the mangled car spinning. It came to a stop when it crashed into a light pole that severely dented the passenger door.

Elijah hadn't been looking and hadn't seen the vehicle bearing down on them until he heard the roar of the engine. He gasped as he saw what was going to happen in a fraction of a second. Belted in, there was no place for him to go. He was jolted to the left and then the right. His head received a blow that briefly knocked him out, but he woke in moments. A bit dizzy, he looked around and tried to assess the situation. The vehicle was crushed from the left-hand side and the woman's body was mashed up against his left side. He could feel her body heat, but could not hear her heart. She was dead.

His head hurt and he was sure he had quite a bump on his scalp and perhaps even a fracture. His left knee hurt and he made no attempt to move it. His right arm was pinned between his partially caved-in door and his body, and he knew the upper part of his arm was broken. His vampire body's healing ability was trying to pull the broken bone edges together, but their position was not good, wedged against the door and out of alignment. The process caused him more pain than if the bones had stayed where they were.

He wanted to use his left arm to straighten the right, but it was pinned firmly under the woman's body. He nudged her with his shoulder, but her side door had her jammed tightly against him. Her warm blood oozed from several wounds, some of it running down the front of Elijah's suit jacket. He had no desire to lick any of it up.

There was nothing he could do. Not yet. In a few minutes, when his arm was healed to whatever degree it could, he might be able to use his vampire strength to break free. He really wanted to get out. In fact, he was afraid. He feared fire. If gas was leaking from the wrecked front end of the Cadillac, it could catch fire from a spark or from the heat of the engine. He did not want to burn. It might kill him, but more likely it would just cause him terrible injury. It was not that easy to kill an Original, but one could suffer terrible pain.

The front windshield's reinforced glass was shattered into a million tiny pieces as well as several large pieces. The view out the front was short due to the fact that the body of the truck's trailer was right there. He hadn't seen it coming until the last second because he'd been looking at the side mirror. It wouldn't have made any difference if he had seen it. The woman had pulled into the intersection when the light turned green and the truck had barreled through and hit them. Why hadn't the truck driver stopped?

He wanted answers, but more than that, he wanted out of the car.

He heard quite a few voices now. People were out there, coming to look at the crash or to try to help those trapped inside. He thought that it would take fire department equipment to free him.

"Elijah! Can you hear me?" came Klaus' voice from close by.

"Yes." Noise above him made him realized his brother was on the roof of the vehicle and in a moment Klaus looked over and down through the shattered windshield.

"Are you badly hurt?"

"Not really. Healing knee and right arm. Bump on the head."

"She appears to be dead," Klaus observed.

"She is. Most unfortunate." Elijah didn't want to look at the woman whose dead weight was on his left arm and against his chest. "I'm pinned in here, Klaus. I would be most grateful if you didn't let the vehicle catch on fire." He didn't want to tell Klaus that he was afraid, but he suspected his brother already knew that.

"We'll get some fire extinguisher foam on the engine and any gas leaking under the car," Klaus assured him.

Elijah knew Klaus always carried such a thing in his vehicles. One never knew when it would come in handy. He heard the sirens of rescue vehicles coming and that reduced his fear somewhat.

_With this witch dead, what will happen to Rebekah and Finn now? _he wondered_. Someone must be guarding them. Surely this car must be registered to the woman – unless it's a rental. Even still, she must have given the rental company an address. Her driver's license must have an address. Of course, it won't help if she is from out of town. I hope she has been living here._

Klaus was gone from the roof and in a moment Kol appeared up there and at the front window.

"This isn't part of the plan, as I recall," he said.

"No. An unforeseen mishap."

"Lose any parts?"

"No. A broken arm and some minor injuries. You'll be pleased to know they are healing. Kol, can you reach in and grab my right hand? If I could get my arm straight it would heal correctly."

Kol slid his body forward and down in front of the windshield. He then reached in though the place where the glass was missing. He had to strain to reach Elijah's hand lying by his thigh. Glass cut into his arm, but he paid no attention to that. Finally, his fingers closed around Elijah's hand.

"I reckon this is going to hurt," he said with a crooked grin.

"Wait a moment. I will try to lean away from that side, but I have little wiggle room," the older brother said. Despite the seatbelt, he did indeed turn his torso a bit to lessen the pressure on his right arm and then said, "Pull!"

Kol pulled and Elijah let out a yelp, but the arm came free. Kol pulled as much as he could to make it straight.

Elijah felt the bone ends come into alignment. "Don't move for a moment, Kol. It's coming together." In another few seconds, he added, "Alright. Let go. Thank you."

Kol carefully withdrew his own arm and righted himself. "The woman's dead," he observed. "How inconvenient."

"Maybe. Or perhaps it makes the rescue easier. She was a strong witch."

"I'll go tell Mother you're fine. Seriously restrained, but fine." With that, Kol disappeared from Elijah's view.

Elijah now could only sit and wait.

As the three little people ran along the hall floor, Finn's towel came undone , fell down around his ankles and tripped him. Landing flat on the hardwood floor, he muttered a curse from his old days as a young Viking. Ignoring the fact that he was embarrassed to be lying there bare-bottomed, he hastily got up and covered himself again.

Rebekah and Melissa made no comment. They had been poorly covered while climbing the stairs and had needed to adjust their "clothing" several times.

"I don't think we are going to be able to reach the door knob or turn it," the sister said, looking ahead. "Perhaps we should be looking for a phone. A land line."

"A what? Oh, you mean the kind with a wire like the ones in the bedrooms," Finn said. He had been shown that telephone in his room by which he could call another room in the house, including the kitchen and the maid service, as well as make what Elijah called "outside" calls.

"Yes," Rebekah said. "Let's look for such a phone. Look for a jack." When her brother stared at her, she added, "The thing in the wall where the phone's line it connected."

He nodded and added, "Let's split up so that we may hunt more quickly."

They did this, each running into a different room. Immediately, Finn found that there were quite a few wires connected to the wall. As in the doll house, the wires led mostly up to lamps. He had no idea what a phone jack looked like.

Melissa called from the kitchen. "I found one! There's a phone on the kitchen counter."

Finn and Rebekah joined her in the big kitchen and stood looking upward. There was a wire coming down beside the end of the counter top to a thing in the wall and Finn decided that it was the mysterious jack.

"How do we get up there?" Melissa asked.

"We can try pulling on the cord until it falls off the counter," Rebekah said. "Or we can try climbing the cord."

"It would be just our luck to break the phone if we pull it down," the human said.

"Okay. I'll climb up," Rebekah said. "I weigh less than you, Finn." She didn't notice that she had called him by his real name. Instead, she concentrated on going up the cord hand over hand, swinging slightly side to side as she went. It was a long climb. For a normal-sized human, the counter was about thirty-six inches tall. For a person Rebekah's size, the distance appeared to be about thirty-six feet. She found that she had enough of her vampire strength to give her the needed stamina. She was more than half way up when her baby-blanket garment slipped down from her chest, over her hips and finally off her feet. She continued up without pause.

Without further mishap, she climbed onto the counter top. Standing up, she walked to the phone, a model that stood on a recharging unit, but could be carried around while in use. It stood taller than she.

_Should I knock it over? I think I can hit the buttons better if I do, _she thought.

Walking around to the back of the unit, she leaned her hands against the upright phone and pushed. It wobbled, but didn't fall over. She shoved it hard and it fell forward onto the counter, face down.

"What's going on?" Finn yelled in his tiny voice.

His sister heard him and walked to the edge of the counter and looked down. "I got the phone off the charger. Now I must turn it over so I can reach the numbers. What number should I call?"

"Klaus or Elijah?" Finn suggested.

"We don't know where we are. All I could tell him is that we are alive and captives of a witch named Kendra and her husband Ron."

"Dial 911," Melissa said. "The emergency operator can tell what phone that is and what the address it. You don't have to give that information if you can't."

"Good idea," Rebekah said. She walked back to the phone and struggled to turn it over. Finally, it was lying on its back. The little vampire had to run around the phone in order to press down hard on the buttons and to be sure the unit was on. She heard the number going through and a woman answered. Knowing her tiny voice would be hard to hear and decipher, Rebekah didn't answer the woman's questions.

Needing to signal that there was a real problem, she walked to where a drinking glass stood near the sink. She again worked at shoving something big and heavy until the glass fell into the sink, landing on a ceramic plate. She was pleased to see both the glass and the plate break, making a loud noise . Hopefully, the 911 operator could hear that.

"Are you alright?" Finn called up.

"Yes," Rebekah said, walking to the edge and looking down at him. Then she noticed that there was a work station "island" in the middle of the kitchen and on it was marked a circle with several candles around it. She realized that it was where the witch miniaturized the plates and food she had been bringing to the doll house. Kendra probably had then made them normal-sized in order to wash them and ready them for the next meal.

Leaving the phone line open to the operator, Rebekah then climbed back down the wire. When she was six feet from the bottom, she let go, landing lightly on the floor. Melissa handed her the baby blanket so that she could cover up again.

Finn wondered why she would bother. He had been shocked to see the brief clothing women wore these days and he had seen pictures of women at the beach in really skimpy swim suits, not to mention the pictures of women in the newspapers with little on. Klaus had told him that those were store advertisements for women's underwear. Still, of course, the brief bits of clothing did cover a woman's nipples and groin area.

Another thing he had noticed while looking at the advertisements was that all the men pictured in modern undergarments seemed to have no hair on their chests or abdomens. He had asked Klaus about this, too, and had been informed that the men who modeled the clothing tended to have the hair removed. Strange customs, Finn thought.

Linek had come to the kitchen door and had been watching. He certainly had enjoyed watching the nude Rebekah climb down the phone line and then dress again, but like the others, he was more concerned about escaping. He finally walked over to Finn.

"Is help coming?" he asked in German.

"Yes. At least we hope so," Finn told him.

Having sent out their distress signal, the trio, along with Linek, had nothing to do but wait and hope help arrived before Kendra or Ron came home.

_A/N What will happen when more big people start tromping around in the house where tiny people are vulnerable? _


End file.
